Red River

For the newly freed black residents of Colfax, Louisiana, the beginning of Reconstruction promised the right to vote, to own property, and, at the very least, control over their own lives. However, in the space of a day, angry whites took back Colfax in one of the most brutal incidents of racial violence in Southern history. Now, in the bitter aftermath, the Tademys and the Smiths will have to deal with the wreckage, push on, and build a better life for their sons and daughters over the next 70 years.

Hailed as "remarkable" (Philadelphia Inquirer), "astonishing" (Essence), and "spellbinding" (Detroit Free Press), Lalita Tademy's first novel, Cane River, was a New York Times best seller and the 2001 Oprah Book Club Summer Selection. Now, once again, Tademy weaves together history and the story of her own family to bring us an epic work of fiction - the dramatic, intertwining tale of two families struggling to make peace for themselves in an America deeply divided after the Civil War.