Yellow Wife

Great read!

Such an awesome & authentic read. The author is sharing a lesser known story in American History about black mixed race women who were forced into relationships with their slave owners. As there were benefits and perks, there was also very low and sad realities that are written about in a way that will forever be imprinted upon my heart. You learn about day to day slave life, sex, cruelty, power, money, and risks slaves had to take in order to a have a little semblance of a normal life. The main character Phoebe felt like a sister, cousin, and an aunt to me. This book is intense and there were times I had to put it down for days at a time. Richmond Virginia has a rich history that tells the story of people who built America and how many sadly enough were broken in the process. This book is filled with love, birth, death, betrayal, and dreams deferred, based on the true accounts of Mary Lumpkin, this is definitely a classic that should be read in high schools and college institutions all over the world. I highly recommend!

Heart-breaking, upsetting and a very moving fictional story that is interwoven with real historical events and real places, such as the Devil’s Acre. What makes this story even more poignant is the knowledge that the brutality and slavery did happen. Even the Plantations, a more civilised existence were still sites of oppression, and it brings to mind the horrors of slavery and the landowners who made it possible. The main protagonist is Pheby Delores Brown, a child of mixed race who lives on the Bell Plantation in Virginia with her parents. After the tragic and untimely death of her mother, the education and freedom promised to Pheby on her eighteenth birthday never materialises and instead she is shipped off by the new mistress to a jail in Richmond Virginia. Catching the eye of the jailer, Marse, Pheby becomes his mistress, “The Yellow Wife”. A title that affords her an easier existence compared to the other slaves that were worked tirelessly, tortured, shackled, and sold and for those that were no longer of any value, murdered. Given a higher status among slaves, does not mean an uncomplicated and pain free existence, for Pheby has no freedom and frequently tends to bruising left on her by the brutal father of her children and is forced to watch the flogging of the man she loves and father of her first child Henry Essex. This was a fantastic book and well written. I felt the author confronted a dark period in history in a way that was respectful of the people and educational for us readers that are still learning the stories from around the world in the 18 and 19th Century that have shaped our world today.

Yellow Wife by Sadeqa Johnson is a breathtaking, gut-wrenching, and deeply human story that has stayed with me long after I turned the final page. Born on a plantation, Pheby is the mixed-race daughter of the plantation’s medicine woman and its master. Her early years are sheltered compared to others around her—she’s educated, admired, and shown a glimpse of a life that feels almost free. But that illusion shatters, and what follows is a journey of unimaginable pain, sacrifice, and survival. This story doesn’t shy away from the brutality of slavery. The depictions of the torture, cruelty, and inhumanity of the slave trade are both harrowing and necessary. What carries the reader through is Pheby’s strength—her fierce love for her children, her devotion to Essex, and her sheer will to endure. The Jailer, with his unpredictable shifts from charm to cruelty, kept me on edge the entire time. I found myself holding my breath through entire chapters. What makes this story even more powerful is knowing it’s inspired by the real-life Mary Lumpkin, an enslaved woman who lived at Devil’s Half Acre as the mistress of a slave trader. Through Pheby’s character, Johnson pays tribute to women whose courage and survival have been erased or forgotten.

Excellent read