When Polly first meets Amari, she doesn't want anything to do with her.

Derby purchases the indenture of a seventeen-year-old girl named Polly, who has 14 years left on her service before she earns her freedom. Percival Derby as a birthday present for his oldest son, Clay. They chain and shackle the healthy youth and cram them into a slave ship set for America. The white men shoot and kill most of Amari's village before setting it on fire. When white men enter her village for the first time, her people welcome them with open arms, but the men are here for violence. She engaged to the most handsome man in her African village, and adored by her parents. The story begins with a happy teenager named amari.

The story is relayed from two viewpoints 15-year-old slave Amari, and 17-year-old indentured servant Polly, Copper Sun is a story of resilience in the face of human depravity, and a hope for freedom against all odds. For example I thought all slaves escaped to the north and canards, but in this gripping story, Amari send Polly are headed to Florida. The hope of a new life is all that keeps them going, but Florida feels so far away and sometimes Amari wonders how far hopes and dreams can really take her. Along the way, their strength is tested like never before as they struggle against hunger, cold, wild animals, hurricanes, and people eager to turn them in for reward money. When an opportunity to escape presents itself, Amari and Molly seize it, fleeing South to the Spanish colony in Florida at Fort Mose. As she struggles to hold on to her memories, she also begins to learn English and make friends with a white indentured servant named Molly. Now, survival is all Amari can dream about. There she was bought by a plantation owner and given to his son as a 'birthday present'. Her family was brutally murdered as she was dragged away to a slave ship and sent to be sold in the Carolinas. But that was what happened when her village was invaded by slave traders. Engaged to the handsomest man in her tribe, adored by her family, and fortunate enough to live in a beautiful village, it never occurred to her that it could all be taken away in an instant. Draper tells the epic story of a young girl torn from her African village, sold into slavery, and stripped of everything she has ever known-except hope.Īmari's life was once perfect. In this “searing work of historical fiction” ( Booklist), Coretta Scott King Award-winning author Sharon M.

Copper sun sharon draper