Caged

CAGEDIn this 3rd novel of the Nandria series set in rural Missouri in 1940, many community members are trapped by poverty, illiteracy, social circumstance, and catastrophe. Nandria Brown Minnick, Black, British war bride visiting her white in-laws with her bi-racial baby daughter, reads stories to neighboring white and Black children in the evenings on the Minnick farm. Gradually, she begins to teach them to read, not realizing that Blacks who learn to read and write are in danger of...
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CAGEDIn this 3rd novel of the Nandria series set in rural Missouri in 1940, many community members are trapped by poverty, illiteracy, social circumstance, and catastrophe. Nandria Brown Minnick, Black, British war bride visiting her white in-laws with her bi-racial baby daughter, reads stories to neighboring white and Black children in the evenings on the Minnick farm. Gradually, she begins to teach them to read, not realizing that Blacks who learn to read and write are in danger of being punished. As Boonetown celebrates at the 4th of July carnival, Nandria pursues the scruffy sergeant who claims to have served under her missing husband. His answers are vague and disquieting. And he, and they, get caught up in the terrors of Marvin the Marvelous riding his motorcycle in the Globe of Death. The children's early reading skills disclose a plot to kidnap and kill.