Also by this author: Orphan Train
Published by Custom House on August 25, 2020
Genres/Lists: Fiction, Historical Fiction
Pages: 370
Read synopsis on Goodreads
Buy the book: Amazon/Audible (this post includes affiliate links)
You know those books that have such great characters that they crawl into your heart and settle there? The Exiles by Christina Baker Kline is one of them. Spanning years and distance and set against the backdrop of British colonization, it tells the stories of three women on the receiving end of that brutality.
Evangeline, Hazel, and Mathinna are memorable for their stories, but they tug on your heartstrings even more so because they are based on real people. There’s Evangeline, a governess sentenced to prison after her pregnancy is discovered; Hazel, a young midwife also sentenced for a minor infraction; and Mathinna, an orphan ripped from her home as an experiment in “taming the natives” by the wife of the new colony’s governor. Though they begin as strangers, their lives intersect as a result of their circumstances.
“All of them fused together to give the tree its solid core. Maybe humans are like that, she thought. Maybe the moments that meant something to you and the people you’ve loved over the years are the rings. Maybe what you thought you’d lost is still there, inside of you, giving you strength.”
If you think this all sounds pretty doom and gloom, that’s because it is (mostly). If The Exiles were a movie, I’m pretty sure it would be filmed in that darker hue that casts a sense of severity upon it. But historical fiction is often an exploration of that which is messy, and there are lessons to be learned in examining our past. It’s how we, hopefully, learn to be better and remember why it’s imperative that we do so.
Desperately heartbreaking, yet punctuated with hope, The Exiles is a novel that tackles various angles of oppression, including race, class, and gender. The ways is which some people are discarded and forgotten is horrific, and the parallels between past and present are not lost on the astute reader. History does, after all, have a tendency to repeat itself, even if it manifests itself in different ways.
Heartbreaking and hopeful, reading The Exiles by @bakerkline is an experience in and of itself. Click To TweetAnd so, through these women, we see the best and worst of what humanity had to offer them. Together and separately, they suffer at the hands of those more powerful, receive unexpected kindnesses from those who surprise them, and exhibit the type of fortitude that only someone in their positions could muster. It’s the story of struggle and oppression, yes, but it’s also the story of hope and dogged perseverance.
The Exiles is one of those books that brings you so fully into it that it is all-encompassing. You can feel the gritty ocean salt on your face, smell the stench of the prison, and feel the anxiety of the characters. You will also feel emotions on behalf of – and alongside – the characters, oftentimes simultaneously. As cliche as it sounds, it’s an easy book to get lost in. I was sad when it ended, not because of how, but because it did at all.
Recommended for: Readers who don’t shy away from darker topics based on real life.