The Dance of Water

Young Hiram Walker was born a slave on a plantation in Virginia. When his mother is sold, Hiram is left with no memory of her, but he receives a mysterious power that saves his life when he nearly drowns in a river. This brush with death awakens in him an urgent desire to devise a daring plan: to escape the only home he knows.

Thus begins the unexpected journey that takes him from the corrupt grandeur of the Virginia plantations to desert guerrilla cells, from the Deep South to the dangerously idealistic movements of the North. And, even in the midst of the war between slaves and slaveholders, Hiram remains determined to rescue the woman he considers his true family, whom he left behind.

This is the dramatic story of an atrocity inflicted on generations of women, men, and children—the violent and arbitrary separation of families and the wars fought for the right to be with those they love. Written by one of today’s most moving authors, The Water Dancer is a transcendent work that restores the humanity of those from whom everything was taken.

From the National Book Award-winning author comes The Water Dancer, one of the most acclaimed novels of all time about racism and the struggle for freedom.