Kidnapped from Galway, Ireland, as a young girl, shipped to Barbados, and forced to work the land alongside African slaves, Cot Daley's life has been shaped by injustice. In this stunning debut novel, Kate McCafferty re-creates, through Cot's story, the history of the more than fifty thousand Irish who were sold as indentured servants to Caribbean plantation owners during the seventeenth century. As Cot tells her story-the brutal journey to Barbados, the harrowing years of fieldwork on the sugarcane plantations, her marriage to an African slave and rebel leader, and the fate of her children—her testimony reveals an exceptional woman's astonishing life.

As Linda Brent, the book's heroine and narrator, Harriet Jacobs recounts the history of her family and recalls the degradation of slavery.

Originally published in 1861, the same year the Civil War swallowed up the nation, here is a compelling autobiographical account written by an African slave who endured tremendous odds in pursuit of her freedom. Harriet Jacobs (1813-1897) delivers a powerful testimony and a candid look at what Southern slavery was truly like for many slaves toiling endlessly on plantations under tyrannical masters and apart from beloved family members. Read about her undaunted courage and tireless faith as she journeyed from a life of perpetual servitude in North Carolina to failed escape attempts to eventual freedom and reunion with her children in the safety of the Free states in the North. Here is a firsthand account of one woman's courageous struggle and determination to endure against all odds. Her story is a must-read and represents a valuable lesson for enduring unfathomable trials and overcoming great odds to achieve freedom with her family.

Ireland, slavery and the Caribbean is a complex and ground-breaking collection of essays. Grounded in history, it integrates perspectives from art historians, architectural and landscape historians, and literary scholars to produce a genuinely interdisciplinary collection that spans from 1620-1830: the high point of European colonialism. By exploring imperial, national and familial relationships from their building blocks of plantation, migration, property and trade, it finds new ways to re-create and question how slavery made the Atlantic world.

Transatlantic literary studies have provided important new perspectives on North American, British and Irish literature. They have led to a revision of literary history and the idea of a national literature. They have changed the perception of the Anglo-American literary market and its many processes of transatlantic production, distribution, reception and criticism. Rather than dwelling on comparisons or engaging with the notion of ‘influence,’ transatlantic literary studies seek to understand North American, British and Irish literature as linked with each other by virtue of multi-layered historical and cultural ties and pay special attention to the many refractions and mutual interferences that have characterized these traditions since colonial times. This handbook brings together articles that summarize some of the crucial transatlantic concepts, debates and topics. The contributions contained in this volume examine periods in literary and cultural history, literary movements, individual authors as well as genres from a transatlantic perspective, combining theoretical insight with textual analysis.