Title of the Book: Sweet Clara And The Freedom Quilt
Author Name: Deborah Hopkinson
Reviewer's Name: Alvin
Publisher: Dragonfly Books
Date of Publication: 1993
Rating: 1-5 Stars ⭐⭐⭐⭐
This was an interesting book to read. The story is about an African American slave, that sewed a
map out of a quilt. Sweet Clara, the main character of the book, was sent away from her home after
being bought by a new master. She was brought out of hard labor, to work as a seamstress under
Aunt Rachel instead. One day, Sweet Clara heard of escape plans, and how they would be so much
simpler with a map. She took it upon herself to sew an entire map of the area, leading all the way up
to Canada, a land where slaves would be free. After Young Jack was caught trying to escape, Clara
worked even harder to finish the map. At the end of the story, she successfully completed the quilt
with the help of many. She used this map to escape with Jack, picking up her mom and the younger
sister she never knew she had as well. The map continued to help other slaves, several of who
escaped to Canada as well.
Overall, this was an informational story, one of back when slavery still ran rampant. The plot
shows the struggles of the slaves and the work they had to do to escape. I’m not sure if this was a
real story, but I find sewing a map in a quilt highly unrealistic. Getting information strictly from
passersby, and accurately representing the information on a quilt, where the error is highly probable,
sounds nigh impossible to do. There was also the question of how Clara was never caught. I’m
almost certain that the slave masters would check on them regularly. Maybe the Americans were
just silly and never noticed any scheming. This is a story that has potential errors, but is still relevant
to source material.
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