River of Hidden Dreams (1994) by Connie May Fowler

 1,001 Novels: A Library of America

River of Hidden Dreams (1994)

by Connie May Fowler

St. Augustine, Florida

Florida: 9/21

   I will say that I like Florida swamp country, which is a fair bit of Florida- I mean, pretty much all of it. The books set in swampland Florida make me want to seek out non-fiction about the area- I have The Orchid Thief, by Susan Orlean in mind. Fowler's protagonist, Sadie Hunter, is a woman of mixed Native/White/Black ancestry, with a link to the midwestern tribes that were imprisoned and re-educated, with her grandmother being a young woman who is "left behind" with white people- she was also the only child brought to the Florida prison.  The emotions are raw, and the choices are fraught.   River of Hidden Dreams also highlights the ethnic fluidity- up to a point- of northern Florida, which is like a racial paradise compared to the 19th century plantation economy of the delta.