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A Mercy
  
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A Mercy [Large Print] (Hardcover)

by Toni Morrison (Author)
3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
Price: £19.95 & this item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions
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  • This item: A Mercy by Toni Morrison

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Product details

  • Hardcover
  • Publisher: ISIS Large Print Books; Large type edition edition (1 Nov 2009)
  • ISBN-10: 0753184826
  • ISBN-13: 978-0753184820
  • Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 4,202,970 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Product Description

Review

`a series of bleakly beautiful vignettes that catch at the heart' --Marie Claire

'Morrison's prose is richly poetic' --Daily Mail

`Must Read' --Sunday Times

`Toni Morrison has done it again'
--TLS

'full of such scrupulous ... amplifications, Morrison's sedulous attention to details ... one measure of her sophistication as a writer.' --The New York Review of Books

`Morrison's prose is confident and secure, her language masterful...This is another penetrating and profoundly disquieting view of America's past'
--Historical Novels Review --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

Review

`Unsettling, exquisitely written, and deeply moving, it's an amazing piece of work' --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.
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Inside This Book (Learn More)
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A Mercy
92% buy the item featured on this page:
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Customer Reviews

12 Reviews
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Average Customer Review
3.2 out of 5 stars (12 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
21 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars "I don't think God knows who we are. I think He would like us, if He knew us, but I don't think He knows about us.", 11 Nov 2008
By Mary Whipple (New England) - See all my reviews
(TOP 10 REVIEWER)   
This review is from: A Mercy (Hardcover)
(4.5 stars) Continuing themes that she has been developing since the start of her career, Nobel Prize-winning author Toni Morrison creates an intense and involving philosophical, Biblical, and feminist novel set in the Atlantic colonies between 1682 and 1690. Her impressionistic story traces slavery from its early roots, using unique voices--African, Native American, and white--while moving back and forth in time. The primary speaker is Florens, a 16-year-old African slave, who tells the reader at the outset that this is a confession, "full of curiosities," and that she has committed a bloody, once-in-a-lifetime crime. In a flashback to 1682, we learn that when Florens was only eight years old, her mother suggested to the Maryland planter who owned the family, that Florens be given to New York farmer Jacob Vaark to settle a debt. Florens never understands why she was abandoned by her mother.

Florens lives and works for the next eight years on Vaark's rural New York farm. Lina, a Native American, who works with her, tells in a parallel narrative how she became one of a handful of survivors of a plague that killed her tribe. Vaark's wife Rebekkah describes leaving England for New York to be married to a man she has never seen. The deaths of their subsequent children are devastating, and Vaark is hoping that eight-year-old Florens will help alleviate Rebekkah's loneliness. Vaark, himself an orphan and poorhouse survivor, describes his journeys from New York to Maryland and Virginia, commenting on the role of religion in the culture of the different colonies, along with their attitudes toward slavery.

All these characters are bereft of their roots, struggling to survive in an alien environment filled with danger and disease. When smallpox threatens Rebekkah's life in 1692, Florens, now sixteen, is sent to find a black freedman who has some knowledge of herbal medicines. Her journey is dangerous and ultimately proves to be the turning point in her life.

Morrison examines the roots of racism going back to slavery's earliest days, providing glimpses of the various religious practices of the time, and showing how all the women are victimized. They are "of and for men," people who "never shape the world, The world shapes us." As the women journey toward self-enlightenment, Morrison describes their progress in often Biblical cadences, and by the end of this novel, the reader understands what "a mercy" really means. An intense and thought-provoking look at various forms of slavery from their beginnings, this short novel has an epic scope, one which admirers of Morrison will celebrate for its intense thematic development, even as they may somewhat regret its sacrifice of fully developed characters. Mary Whipple

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6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Journey into American Past to Understand American Present, 11 Nov 2008
By Ford Ka (Edinburgh, Scotland) - See all my reviews
  
This review is from: A Mercy (Hardcover)
In her latest novel Toni Morrison takes us back to the late 17th century America. The plot gives her an opportunity to present America in the making, there is no US yet, there are colonies, each somewhat different in their culture, religion or attitude to slavery. Morrison adroitly shapes the plot in such a way as to give the reader at least an impression of the variety that once was America, sending her characters on distant voyages. The differences are the most clearly visible in the opposition between Maryland and New York yet the choice of character also helps Morrison to stress the diversity of American roots.
And yet "A Mercy" is not just a historical novel. The setting is important but Morrison seems much more interested in her characters. This concentration is reflected in the form of the book - we get to know about the events from the characters in a series of monologues which culminate in the final monologue of Florens' mother which ties some of the book's loose ends and answers some of its haunting questions.
Each of the monologues comes from a completely different character - a slave, a native American, a Dutch etc. - this variety is almost incredible but serves to add a depth to the book, broadens the view the reader gets.
As usual in Morrison's fiction the characters are mostly women. As a result the book to some degree fails as a HIStory book, it is much more of a HERstory book, offering the reader a selection of points of view usually missing in more traditional history writing both fictional and scholarly.
In short: another great book from a Nobel-prize winning novelist.
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6 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars Wouldn't bother, 15 May 2009
By Campbell79 (England) - See all my reviews
This review is from: A Mercy (Hardcover)
This book had great potential and I was looking forward to reading it. However I really struggled with, well, everything. I did not like the style of writing and found myself speed-reading and not taking anything in. I have given this book out and have found that it is soon returned to me as the borrower has had the same problems as me. Sorry to Toni Morrison but I would certainly not recommend this to anyone and I only gave one star as I had to give it something. Don't waste your money.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

2.0 out of 5 stars Couldn't get into it
I really couldn't get into this book. I loved 'Beloved', but nothing interested me here - the characters weren't appealing or well-developed enough to make me care about them, and... Read more
Published 3 months ago by Rachel Ropper

1.0 out of 5 stars Very disappointing
I was looking forward to this book immensely, the subject matters being of interest to me.
However, from almost the first page, I found the writing style very difficult to... Read more
Published 3 months ago by Mabel Stark

1.0 out of 5 stars An emperor's new clothes
Does anyone truly understand this book? It seems like the Emperor's new clothes to me. People praising it because other critics have praised it, not because it is truly... Read more
Published 3 months ago by TP Hermolle

3.0 out of 5 stars A good idea..not perfectly carried through.
You can read good synopses of the plot from other reviewers, so I won't include on here.

I had to read this book twice before I got anything out of it. Read more
Published 4 months ago by Lola465

4.0 out of 5 stars Morrison at her best...
Like many people my attitude towards Morrison's work has often been ambivalent - a mix of admiration and apprehension. Read more
Published 5 months ago by BlestMiss T

3.0 out of 5 stars Evocative, but not her best work
This is not my favourite Toni Morrison book although I love her other works. It is beautifully, poetically written, and I was immediately drawn in and absorbed by the predicament... Read more
Published 6 months ago by Parvati P.

4.0 out of 5 stars Immensely rewarding
Toni Morrison brings together a disparate group of people to give us a view of life in the American colonies in the latter part of the seventeenth century. Read more
Published 12 months ago by Mick Read

4.0 out of 5 stars A Mercy
I was very eager to read a brand new Toni Morrison book. I had discovered her quite a few years ago when I came across Beloved. Read more
Published 12 months ago by Mrs. J. E. Hamilton

5.0 out of 5 stars Admirable and mysterious
A small book by a rare writer, and yet a mysterious book because it is difficult to know and understand what the author wants to say, what's more prove with her story. Read more
Published 13 months ago by Jacques COULARDEAU

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