Alan Cheuse on ‘Song of Slaves in the Desert’

The Takeaway

The history of slavery is interwoven with the history of America, but what most of us learn about in school is the history of white settlers. And even in that white history, there are particular characters –  mostly Dutch and Anglo-Saxon Protestants. Not Catholics, and certainly not Jews.  But that may be about to change. A new novel called “Song of Slaves in the Desert” centers on a slave family and its owners, who are Jewish.  It’s written by Alan Cheuse, the novelist and George Mason University professor who you might know as the books reviewer for NPR’s All Things Considered.

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