Ratings

Content Ratings based on a 0-5 scale where
0 = no objectionable content and
5 = an excessive or disturbing level of content

Guide to Rating System

LANGUAGE

VIOLENCE

SEXUAL CONTENT

ADULT THEMES

Title: Chains (Seeds of America)

Author: Laurie Halse Anderson

National Book Award Finalist

2009 Scott O’Dell Award for Historical Fiction

Language: A few instances where it’s written “He cursed” but no actual swear words were spelled out. Also several derogatory comments and name calling: yellow-bellied cowards, bloody wench, miserable cow, idiot.

Violence: Being a book about slavery, there were a lot of descriptions of violence towards the slaves. Isabel and Ruth were pulled, grabbed, slapped and beaten as well as hit with a fireplace poker, a broom and a chair. A painting is hit over Isabel’s head. Isabel is lashed, beaten (she loses teeth) and dragged behind a cart through the town and then branded on her face. The book also takes place during the Revolutionary War, so there are a number of instances where battles are described. One boy talks about seeing another boy’s head shot off from a cannon ball. Talk of arms and limbs flying. A few hangings are witnessed. Also, there is a bit of abuse towards a wife. There are bruises on her wrists. Screams are heard from another room as she is pushed against the wall. And, while it’s not exactly violence, there are some descriptions of seeing piles of charred bodies (from a fire) and piles of frozen bodies (from the prison conditions being so poor).

Adult Themes: Slavery is a main theme in the book. There is a lot of talk about the buying and selling of humans. They are mistreated almost every step of the way. A lot of abuse, verbal and physical, to the young girls who are the slaves. Descriptions of the horrors of war. Young boys and men going into battle. Fighting for freedom. Spousal abuse. Descriptions of the terrible conditions the prisoners of war had to endure while in prison: Little to no food, freezing cold with nothing to keep them warm, living in their own filth and excrement. Some talk of death, burial and ghosts.

Synopsis

Isabel and Ruth are sold to a Loyalist family in New York during the time of the Revolutionary War. All Isabel can think of is freedom for herself and her sister, something she should have had upon the death of her former owner. She tries everything she can to obtain this freedom, but she’s never sure who she can trust and who will really be able to help her gain the freedom she desperately wants.

I thought this was a fantastic book. I haven’t read very much historical fiction, but this one may have made me a fan. It really brought life to something that I’d only learned before through memorizing dates and names. While some of the descriptions of war and especially of the treatment of the slaves were hard for me to read, I think it’s such a good thing to learn from the past. Laurie Halse Anderson did a great job of blending the history of it all with the fictional story of Isabel and Ruth. I truly loved Isabel and was rooting for her the whole way. I think this would be a great book for as young as 11 or 12-year-olds.