Call of the Raven
by
Wilbur Smith and Corban Addison
Genre: Fiction
"And what use is freedom, if it is only the freedom to live
in a slum until you are worked to death? What use is a
wage if it does not buy you enough to eat?" - Call of the Raven
The book opens with Cambridge Union debate between Fairchild and St. John arguing for and against slavery. But what exactly is freedom? This thread runs through the entire book, what exactly is freedom?
Mungo St. John returns from Britain to America only to find his father murdered and the love of his life, Camilla, a slave on his father's estate murdered by the militia of his father's trusted banker, Chester Marion. He has is penniless as his entire fortune has been pledged. While young St. John vows revenge on Chester Marion, he discovers his own family is not entirely innocent and finds himself on a ship to Africa to earn his fortune. He loses his innocence about all that he considers decent and is ready to do anything for revenge but then he discovers that Camilla is alive. He changes again and now all he wants is to rescue his love while destroying his enemy in the process. Will he?
Reading the book was a revelation. I always thought I knew what freedom was and then began to wonder if I really knew while reading this book. It is amazing how we are all slaves and free at the same time when we think about it. Is the world really free from slavery now? Are we truly free or is our freedom just an illusion while we remain slaves in the hands of the system that controls us? Is selling and buying humans really off the table in this century when you compare it to the years of slave trade? Sure, most of us are not bound physically and dragged out to work in return for three meals a day and a roof over our head but has the system truly changes ?
The writing is like picturesque and adventurous like any Wilbur Smith novel with heroes. I would recommend everyone to read this.
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