Eliza's Freedom Road
An Underground Railroad Diary
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Table of Contents
About The Book
It is 1854 in Alexandria, Virginia. Eliza’s mother has been sold away and Eliza is left as a slave on a Virginia farm. It is Abbey, the cook, who looks after Eliza, when she isn’t taking care of the Mistress. Eliza has only the quilt her mother left her and the stories her mother told to keep her mother’s memory close.
When the Mistress’s health begins to fail and Eliza overhears the Master talk of the Slave sale auction and of Eliza being traded, she takes to the night. She follows the path and the words of the farmhand Old Joe: “Travel the night. Sleep the day…Go east. Keep your back to the setting of the sun. Come to the safe house with a candlelight in the window…That gal, Harriet, she’ll take you.”
All the while, Eliza recites the stories her mother taught her as she travels along her freedom road from Mary’s Land to Pennsylvania to Freedom’s Gate in St. Catharines, Canada, where she finds not only her freedom but also more than she could have hoped for.
About The Illustrator
Shadra Strickland studied, design, writing, and illustration at Syracuse University and later went on to complete her MFA at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. She won the Ezra Jack Keats Award and the Coretta Scott King - John Steptoe Award for New Talent in 2009 for her work in her first picture book, Bird, written by Zetta Elliott. Strickland coillustrated Our Children Can Soar, winner of a 2010 NAACP Image Award. She teaches illustration at Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore, Maryland. Visit her online at ShadraStrickland.com.
Product Details
- Publisher: Simon & Schuster/Paula Wiseman Books (February 14, 2017)
- Length: 176 pages
- ISBN13: 9781481498326
- Ages: 8 - 12
- Lexile ® 670L The Lexile reading levels have been certified by the Lexile developer, MetaMetrics®
Awards and Honors
- Volunteer State Book Award Nominee (TN)
- ALA/YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults - Nominee
Resources and Downloads
High Resolution Images
- Book Cover Image (jpg): Eliza's Freedom Road Trade Paperback 9781481498326
- Author Photo (jpg): Jerdine Nolen Photo by Nancy Kavanagh O'Neill(0.1 MB)
Any use of an author photo must include its respective photo credit