Unbound: A Novel in Verse

About this book

From the award-winning author of All the Broken Pieces, comes a new novel-in-verse that is a gripping, transcendent story about a little-known piece of slave history.

Grace has grown up in slavery. As difficult as life on the Virginia plantation is, at least she has her family: Momma, her younger brothers, Thomas and Willy, Aunt Sara, and Uncle Jim. When she overhears Master and Mistress plotting to sell her brothers, she and her family decide to run away that same night. But without time to plan their escape and go north along the Underground Railroad, their only choice is to head deep into the woods of the Dismal Swamp—a remote wilderness, filled with wild animals; daily searches for food, water, and shelter; and the ever present anxiety of being caught.

Historians have recently discovered evidence of the Dismal Swamp, and a community of slaves who sought refuge there. Ann Burg’s unflinching story, written in her signature luminous verse, sheds light on this little-known story and the courage of a people who risked everything for the chance to be free.

Reviews

Awards and Praise for Unbound:

Arnold Adoff Poetry Award for Middle Readers, Honor Book

Christopher Award, Books for Young People

Awards and Praise for All the Broken Pieces:

Jefferson Cup award winner

Booklist Editors' Choice

ALA Best Books for Young Adults

IRA Notable Book for a Global Society

ALA Popular Paperback for Young Adults

*"[A] stirring debut novel . . . will make readers want to rush to the end and then return to the beginning again to make connections between past, present, friends and enemies."--Booklist, starred review

*"The verse form carries highly charged emotions and heavy content with elegiac simplicity." --Kirkus Reviews, starred review

*"Using spare free verse, first-time novelist Burg beautifully evokes the emotions of a Vietnamese adoptee as he struggles to come to terms with his past." --Publishers Weekly, starred review

"...the story is a lovely, moving one." --School Library Journal

Awards and Praise for Serafina's Promise:

Starred review from Kirkus Reviews and School Library Journal

Kirkus Best Book of the Year

Parents' Choice Gold Award winner

School Library Journal Best Books of the Year

New York Public Library 100 Books for Giving and Sharing

The Herald-Sun Wilde Award for Longer books, Middle grade novel

Cybils Awards Finalists, Middle Grade Fiction

NAACP Image Awards Outstanding Literary Work-Youth/Teens nominee

ALA Notable Book

ALA Notable Trade Book in the Field of Social Studies

Michigan Great Lakes Great Books Award nominee

Bank Street College Children's Book Committee - Best Children's Books of the Year

Américas Award, Commended Title

Kansas' William Allen White Award

"Serafina's dreams are challenged by poverty, flood, and earthquake, but her tenacious spirit hangs on through it all. The grace of the Haitian people is revealed in Burg's poetic language, the vastness of Haiti's needs apparent in the details of Serafina's world. Serafina's journey is one readers will find unsettling but, at the same time, rich with examples of true courage and dignity." --Karen Hesse, author of the Newbery Medal winner Out of the Dust and Safekeeping

"Serafina is certainly a resilient and admirable character who will touch the hearts of many adults as well as children and put a human face on the poverty and tragedies of the Haitian people. Through this story, Ann extends the reputation she established with All the Broken Pieces." --Don Gallo

"Ann E. Burg has masterfully crafted a lovingly cadenced book in which, behind each gemlike story, another gemlike story rises, synchronizing poetically with the local landscape, where there is another mountain behind each mountain. Serafina's Promise, a fascinating poetic tale, a magic window that opens gently and brings to your heart the cultural richness and wonders of a fate-taunting nation." --Denize Lauture