Caleb's Crossing

I really enjoyed this novel by Geraldine Brooks, which is a fictionalized account of a real person, Caleb, the first Native American to matriculate from Harvard. But the book is really more about Bethia Mayfield, the young English girl who befriends him on 17th-century Martha's Vineyard, and the surprising life she leads.

 Bethia is the daughter of the island's Calvinist minister, and is an educated young woman, a rarity for the time. That she gets her education clandestinely, listening in on her brother's lessons and soon outpacing him, tells us something of her spunk and wit. Bethia lives a long and interesting life, moving from the Vineyard to Cambridge, to Padua and back. The book is her memoir, written in bits and pieces over the course of her life, from minister's daughter to indentured servant to doctor's wife.

Bethia's best friend on the island is Caleb, son of the Wampanoag chief who also has a thirst for books and learning. It is left to Bethia to tell Caleb's story, and she does so beautifully and with great feeling.

Brooks does a wonderful job of bringing Caleb and Bethia to life. This was a really lovely book.

Caleb's Crossing