Libertie: A Novel, Kaitlin Greenidge, author; Channie Waites, narrator
As a young girl, Libertie Sampson witnesses what she believes is her mother, Cathy, bringing a man, Ben-Daisy, back to life. Cathy, a doctor and free woman who was never a slave, is secretly helping to smuggle runaway slaves to safety. Her friend Elizabeth transports the escapees in coffins.
After the Civil War, when slaves are free, Cathy builds a hospital for “colored women”. She is well practiced in homeopathic treatments and begins to teach women about their anatomy, as well. She treats both black and white patients. Libertie does not understand why her mother does that, since white people treated them so poorly. Libertie never feels quite free, although she was never a slave. Her mother is light-skinned, but Libertie is dark.
Cathy has begun to train Libertie to be a doctor. When Libertie’s behavior and attitude lead her to believe that she has taught her as much as she can, she sends her away to school. Libertie interprets her mother’s actions with anger. She believes she is being turned out of her home. She feels that her mother has rejected and abandoned her and wants some kind of retribution. She is often headstrong and makes immature decisions. She harbors resentments. When she flunks out of school, she does not tell her mother. Instead, She blames her, seemingly unfairly, for many of her disappointments in life, and plots retaliation. She seems to want to hurt her. Yet every time she does, she also seems repentant, but is unable to admit it. Although she is bright and mature in many ways, she is naïve and immature in others.
After she returns home from school, to Kings County, in Brooklyn, NY, she meets her mother’s boarder, another doctor, Emmanuel Chase. They fall in love, and in spite of her mother’s objections, she insists on marrying him. Her mother feels betrayed by both of them and distances herself from Libertie, not speaking to her until the day she is married. In spite of her frustration and disappointment, she arranged the wedding.
Libertie moves to the island of Haiti with Emmanuel, hoping to finally feel free. What she discovers is that there, where they are all one color, there is still a hierarchy of color and class. Religion, spirits and superstition control behavior, there, as well as in New York. She is judged and falls short in the eyes of many. When she meets Emmanuel’s father, Bishop Chase, it is not a happy introduction. He is hurt because he was not consulted by his son before he married. He is rude and cold. Emmanuel’s letters explaining his marriage apparently never arrived. When she meets his twin sister, Ella, who is also rude and unfriendly, she realizes she is considered “mad”. She is angry, once again, because Emmanuel has been keeping secrets from her. She still does not feel entirely free, as she had hoped, although she begins to love the beauty of the island.
As more secrets are revealed and Emmanuel’s expectations become harder to fulfill, she grows somewhat uncomfortable with her situation. When she becomes pregnant, she begins to question the reasons for her marriage and the future her children will face. She begins to miss the mother she has forsaken and written to rarely. When a traveling entertainment troupe arrives, she hears her mother’s friends singing. Because of her advanced state of pregnancy, she could not attend the performance, but heard them through the window. She insists Emmanuel find them and invite them to their home. They offer her salvation and she makes decisions that will affect her going forward. As she matures, she begins to value family and love in different ways. As Libertie finally comes of age, she discovers that what was once important, no longer is, and what once seemed unnecessary is of immediate necessity now.