Freedom Over Me: Eleven Slaves, Their Lives and Dreams Brought to Life by Ashley Bryan

A long time ago, slaves were treated terribly and sold for prices like what animals or objects would cost. Author Ashley Bryan collected some real documents about slaves and chose the Fairchild’s Slave Appraisement to write about. This was a receipt which showed eleven slaves for sale along with cows, hogs, and cotton. The document only listed the names and prices of the slaves, so Ashley made up ages and jobs for them. The slaves have different jobs, such as Peggy is the cook, Stephen the builder, Jane the seamstress, and Bacus the blacksmith. All of the slaves have different personalities and dreams, too, wanting to be free of course, and some of them secretly even want to get married. The illustrations are somewhat realistic, and I like how the illustrator gives swirls and marks on the skin. It is appealing how everything is written in first person because it feels like all of it is true when the person is saying it himself/herself. It’s interesting how the author decided to write in free verse. The author did a good job imagining what it might have been like for slaves.