"Every happiness is a bright ray between shadows, every gaiety bracketed by grief. There is no birth that does not recall a death, no victory but brings to mind a defeat."
-from the novel
I selected Caleb's Crossing for our book club because it was a "book bundle" from our library (multiple copies), it was historical fiction and because we had read People of the Book by this author and liked it. I am giving it a 5---I LOVED it! I am not sure everyone in our group will. You may remember historical fiction is my favorite genre but you may not know I have a particular interest in colonial America. It was right up my alley!
The story is told, almost as if a diary, by Bethia Mayfield, who is 12 years of age in 1660. At the outset she is living on an island now known as Martha's Vineyard with her family, having originated from the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Her father is a missionary among the native Wampanoags. Bethia meets a native near her age who becomes a secret companion; she calls him Caleb. As fate would have it, he ends up under her father's tutelage.
The story proceeds to Cambridge when the very bright Caleb and another native, Joel, end up at Harvard College. Bethia arrives there, too, not as a student, but due to circumstances with her brother. Though the daughter of a minister, she is a headstrong young woman with feminist ideas ahead of her time. I don't want to give away much of the plot but I will comment on some other things that kept my attention.
First, I was so very impressed with the dialect used in the book. I recently selected a historical character of colonial Williamsburg and wrote a script for myself. It was very difficult finding proper words and phrases of the 18th century and my script was only a few pages. The author's research was meticulous. I felt transported! Also, I have visited Martha's Vineyard and the Wampanoag village at Plimoth Plantation. I remembered John Winthrop, Anne Hutchinson and King Philip's War from history. The Afterword is fascinating as the author explains that Caleb's character is based on a real man and Bethia is completely fictional.
I liked the challenging vocabulary---several words I noted to look up later. I found the word "salvages" interesting as it was used in place of savages. I just watched a TV documentary on the lost colony of Roanoke and the stone being researched had the word salvages. As you know I like to find a juicy quote to begin each post. There were SO many in this book, it was hard to settle on one!
There was a scene I really enjoyed early in the book where Bethia is beginning to teach Caleb the alphabet. It reminded me so much of a YA novel called The Sign of the Beaver by Elizabeth George Speare, a favorite of mine when I was teaching 5th grade. In it a young pioneer attempts to teach a native to read. I found humor in both situations.
I have now realized Geraldine Brooks won a Pulitzer Prize for her novel, March, another historical fiction of the Civil War Era. Guess what I am reading next!
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When our Page Turners met, the average rating for Caleb's Crossing was 4.2. The discussion was lively and enjoyable. Most of the participants liked the book and found the clash of cultures thought-provoking. Several in the group expected Bethia and Caleb to become a couple but we agreed that just wouldn't have worked. We liked that Bethia was an independent thinker, questioning much of the Puritan theology and accepting the natives as they were.
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