Africatown charts the fraught history of America from those who were brought here as slaves but nevertheless established a home for themselves and their descendants – a community which often thrived despite persistent racism and environmental pollution.
Much of this story is effectively and simply explained in just the introduction. Africatown, throughout, has a sense of immediacy and intimacy, the readers almost seem to learn this important saga of African American history with the author. Better copy editing would have made the text smoother, however. Although sometimes abrupt and crude, overall the prose flows and reads well, both fast and enlightening. More explanation of terms such as the 'middle passage' or of the international efforts to end the transatlantic slave trade... would help some readers.
Absorbing... Tabor tells this history seamlessly through key individuals ... Progress has been halting. The Mobile city government is happy to install laudatory plaques but reluctant to spend the money for real preservation. But the spiritual and biological descendants of that first Africatown generation, dragged from their homes and enslaved by racist white criminals, push on.
Tabor’s detailed history is a good complement to Ben Raines’ The Last Slave Ship. A sharp portrait of a unique American town that stands as 'a stark symbol of self-determination.'
