Wake of the Wind

About this book

The Wake of the Wind is J. California Coopers third novel and her most penetrating look yet at the challenges that generations of African Americans have had to overcome in order to carve out a home and future for themselves and their families. Set in the South in the waning years of the Civil War this is the dramatic story of a remarkable heroine Lifee and her husband Mor. When Emancipation finally comes to Texas Mor Lifee and their family set out in search of hope and a piece of land they can work and call their own. Miraculously they manage not only to survive but to succeed--their crops grow their children thrive they educate themselves and others. But the South during Reconstruction is not a place that takes kindly to the achievements of former slaves and as lynchings and injustice become a plague across the region time and again they must make the anguished decision to leave their land in search of a safer place. Land however is the least of their worldly possessions. Lifee and Mor are the descendants of a long and vital line. Having used their intelligence strength and ingenuity to make their place in the new post-Civil War world they in turn pass those talents along to their children--the next generation to surge forward accomplishing more than their parents could even dream. At once tragic and triumphant this is an epic story that captures with extraordinary authenticity the most important struggle of the last hundred years.