(Knopf Publishing Group) We meet Washington “Wash” Black at a young age, an 11-year-old field slave on a Barbados sugar plantation around the year 1830. He is fortuitously called to serve as manservant to the plantation owner’s cousin, Christopher “Titch” Wild — inventor, eccentric, abolitionist — for the sole reason that he makes suitable ballast for the Cloud-Cutter, the balloon contraption that hastens their departure. Titch discovers Wash’s gift, and while nurturing this talent, he also teaches him to r … (read more)
