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Bound for Canaan

Margaret Blair Young, Darius Aidan Gray

Salt Lake City, Utah: Bookcraft, 2002

  • Darius Aidan Gray: Author
  • Margaret Blair Young: Author
Novel, Historical Fiction
African American pioneers; African American Mormons; Mormon pioneers; Utah; Christian fiction
The first book of this trilogy followed a few of the black converts who knew Joseph Smith personally, including Elijah Abel, who received the priesthood with Smith's knowledge and approval, and Jane Manning James, who lived as a family member in the Smith home. The second novel picks up their story for the Mormon trek west to the Salt Lake Valley under Brigham Young's leadership, and also chronicles the Civil War and the growing emigrations to California. The novel succeeds not only in opening a door on the early black Mormon experience; it also places that experience within the larger context of national race relations. Readers will get refresher courses on Dred Scott, Civil War politics, slave auctions, lynch mobs, blackface minstrelsy and more. One of the Mormon authors (Gray) is African-American, and his own ancestors figure in the novels. [Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information]

Related Works

Relationship Work Contributors Genre
Published in Standing on the Promises, volume 2 Darius Aidan Gray, Margaret Blair Young Novel
Reviewed in Bound for Importance Jeff Needle Review
Reviewed in [Review of] Bound for Canaan by Margaret Blair Young D. Michael Martindale Review
Reviewed in [Review of] Bound for Canaan by Margaret Blair Young Jeff Needle Review
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