Sandra Shwayder Sanchez

llbird is a family history through five generations beginning with Alwyn, mother of Jamie and Abel. Abused and abandoned by her husband, she becomes a mid wife. It is then that she is accused of being a witch and murdered. Introduced only through the memory of her son Abel, she is the ancestor of the others. The story begins with Rosie/Stillbird as she buries her husband Jamie. Part Native American she was born to a tribe that had escaped The Trail of Tears that killed so many but their survival forced the tribe to live in secrecy. After her husband's death she must deal with unwelcome attentions of his brother who has always wanted her for himself. She returns to her tribe as No-Name, not accepted back into the tribe but not abandoned by them either. But Abel follows her, determined to wait for her.

The story follows the generations from the woods and poverty of early North Carolina to the birth of Stillbird's great grandson in religious revival camp to the post World War II America. It is a look at the product of rape, abuse and incest. This is not a tale of family progress but of a family trapped in its history of violence and madness. What is amazing about this book is the author's excellent combination of foreshadowing and surprise in the story line. While she clearly tells the reader what to expect it still astounds as the pieces of the plot follow one another in ever saddening swirls.

Stillbird is an entry to the world of Classic Fiction by The Wessex Collection. Wessex Collection is a group of writers who feel they should use their talents to help create social justice in the modern world. Sanchez uses her back ground as an attorney to address the issue of violence against women. But she is able to extend the metaphor to cover the attitudes of a world that does not see the obvious, that can blind itself to those it chooses not to see. As Mary, the granddaughter of Stillbird faces her own terror those in the town around her turn a blind eye to that which was in front of them. Sanchez is able to draw the reader into the anomalous humanity of the characters and their lives. It is a thoughtful yet powerful portrayal of family dynamics gone drastically wrong, generation after generation in a cycle of lost mankind.… (plus d'informations)