Sugar by Jewel Parker Rhodes is about a 10 year old named “Sugar”, who lives on a plantation along the Mississippi river. This historical fiction novel explains the daily life of this girl who experienced the before and after effects of slavery. What hooked me on the book as a reader was the way Sugar’s day to day life was explained and written. 

Synopsis:

Sugar is about a ten year old girl named “Sugar”, who lives on a plantation along the Mississippi river. She is fatherless, and soon becomes an orphan. Slavery just ended, but she cannot leave anywhere, doesn’t have enough money, and is forbidden to have any sort of relationship with white people. See dreams to see the world for once since she has not left this plantation. 

Review 

Jewel Parker Rhodes used lyrical realism as her writing style. I haven’t read books with this type of writing before or heard of it until I read this book. The story was well written, and flowed like water. Pacing was good along with the wet i g style which made it easy and enjoyable to read which makes this book a great story! 

Each character was written with a great personality. Sugar was a girl who wanted to explore the world and see the true colors of Earth, but as an orphan and having not enough money, her options were quite limited. Billy, being the plantation owner‘s white son, was able to do many things, everything except interact with the black workers of the plantation. Billy secretly didn’t listen and was willing to be Sugar’s friend, knowing that he was breaking his fathers rules, he knew that breaking the rules would be right in his situation. Beau and Master Liu were the nice Chinese workers who helped with the sugar cane harvest and were willing to be Sugar’s friend even though they are older than her. All of these four characters are my favorite because they all take risks yet still follow the rules and are able to all be friends. 

The main themes of Sugar were friendship and freedom. Freedom is a main theme because “Sugar” hardly got any freedom, didn’t have friends, and didn’t have a biological family. Friendship was a primary theme because once Billy, Beau, and Master Liu met Sugar, it was like her wound that she had since she was born slowly started to heal. 

The plot is that Sugar lives on a sugar cane plantation after slavery ends, becomes an orphan, and after a while makes friends with a white boy named Billy, and two Chinese workers who were welcomed to help named Beau and Master Liu. Each chapter was told through Sugar from beginning to end. 

I liked the cultural friendships between Sugar, Billy, Beau, and Master Liu. Even though they are from different cultural backgrounds, they still become each other’s family and stay friends. 

What I didn’t like would be the loneliness Sugar feels at times, because even though she developed strong friends, the times she didn’t have any friends was painful for her, and it is hard for me to read moments like that. 

Sugar was a very nice and comforting book to read for me and Jewel Parker Rhodes outdid herself on this novel. I definitely recommend this book to people who like historical fiction novels and learning about friendship. 

I would give this book: 📚 📚 📚 📚 📚– an emotional yet comforting read! (5/5) 

Best, Smaya

GFB Ambassador