I Am Jayvyn
Circa 1710: Jayvyn is a 12-year-old African boy who is preparing for his manhood rites and farming the family’s rice fields when slave traders kill his father and kidnap Jayvyn, his mother, and little sister. Jayvyn manages to survive the appalling conditions on the voyage to Barbados, where he is put to work on a sugar cane plantation in order to “season” him: learn English and what is expected of him as a slave. On land, he witnesses (and experiences) how cruelly the overseers punish slaves who won’t obey the rules. Once he learns some English, he begins to make friends with some of his fellow workers, only to be torn away without a chance to say goodbye when he is sold and transported to South Carolina to work on rice plantations near Charleston.
The preface states that one of Brown’s motivations for writing the book was the 2023 Florida government restriction on how African American history can be taught in schools plus a reaction to the “failure to credit African Americans for their contributions to America’s success,” such as African knowledge on the methods of growing rice and other crops. The first third of the book is indelibly harrowing: seeing the ill and dead being thrown overboard to the sharks and the brutal physical punishments meted out to erring slaves on land. The last section in Charleston isn’t as memorable, as here Jayvyn’s life is less emphasized and more information dumps occur. Brown includes many explanatory footnotes, some of which are interesting and some of which come across as didactic. The dialect used in the slaves’ conversations may require some effort to understand. While I appreciated Brown’s extensive research plus learning more about enslaved people’s experiences, additional editing would improve the flow of the story.
