Paul Laurence Dunbar
2 books
- You feel the Berry family’s displacement in every cramped room and dangerous New York street, while Dunbar’s anger at racist power stays close to the surface. It’s melodramatic and sometimes blunt, but Hester’s fear and Joe’s reckless hunger for freedom give the novel real emotional weight.
- Freddie Brent gets raised by the flinty, dutiful Hester Prime and pushed toward a pulpit he never asked for, and watching him wrestle free of other people's plans for his soul still stings. It's quiet and earnest, worth it if small-town moral pressure interests you.