I read this for a project. I thought it was a great story about how to use your voice and make a change.

I take issue with Lasky's use of the term "enslavement" to describe the American colonies' relationship to England in the 1770s, but otherwise this is a decent basic biography. I especially appreciate the scene where Phillis has to sit at tea in the home of "the man who was responsible for her kidnapping." Framing the scene as she does, Lasky helps highlight Phillis's experience of alienation, contradiction, and trauma. ( )

A great informational book that delves deep into Ms.Wheatley's life. Though the book itself is good I can't help but notice a few racist undertones that could have been fixed with just a few different words. ( )

This biography about Phillis Wheatley is nothing short of lovely. It describes her life from the moment she was taken on the ship to America to when her Owner died. There were so many beautiful poetic elements throughout the book. Those elements lead to my interest in the book through the whole thing. I was hanging on every word.
The illustrations are beautiful and the author does a great job of doing Wheatley justice. To be a slave and be able to read and write is something almost unheard of. Wheatley had a huge impact on the black community of America when they had little to no hope. Her story is compelling and painfully beautiful. Lasky does a wonderful job of sharing it. ( )

The life of Phillis Wheatley, who was kidnapped from the African continent and enslaved as a house servant in Boston, is told clearly and with special attention paid to Phillis's path as a poet and writer. The author pays special attention to how Phillis last saw her mother in Africa, before Phillis was separated from her mother and father by enslavement. This memory is referred to several times to show Phillis's positioning and voice as a writer – how, though she is finely educated and devoted to her craft, Phillis's life is distinct from other writers being published in the 1700s, as Phillis was the first Black American woman to be published and this occurrence was a rarity.

The illustrations are lovely oil paintings, though I did not appreciate the illustrator's note that "Phillis Wheatley proved to everyone around her that all things are possible if you work for them" – this kind of messaging implies that hard work equals success. In the light of slavery and the institution of racism, hard work rarely leads to "success" or leaving slavery. Hard work done by a Black enslaved person generally lead to continued oppression, to the benefit of white people, with little to no recourse for Black enslaved people. So this sentiment is a poor choice.

Clearly written and engrossing, but lacking in anti-racist sentiment. I would have liked to see the author push back at the institution of slavery, calling out the fact that though Phillis Wheatley was formally educated, hundreds of thousands of enslaved people were denied access to education and were brutalized. It would have also been useful if the author were to push back on the Wheatleys' role in Phillis's life. I would have liked to see Susannah and John Wheatley be referred to as slave owners, to remind the audience of their culpability to the institution of slavery - and to see some push back against the idea that Susannah Wheatley "saw Phillis as a daughter". I think the narrative of Susannah Wheatley as a kindly slave owner who just wanted a "personal servant" and was "impressed" by Phillis's intelligence is not in keeping with an anti-racist framework. Slave owners should not be portrayed as kindly or without culpability, no matter how "nicely" they treated the people they enslaved. ( )