Lullaby by Consuelo Hamilton is a passionate, gripping, and heartfelt story of one enslaved woman's journey as a talented singer caught in the midst of love and loss.

Nadeline “Nady” McCullen was just two years old when Master McCullen, owner of a North Carolina plantation, requested her to sing to an audience of wealthy white house guests. Nady amazed the audience with her beautiful voice, while bringing tears to her dear mother’s eyes. Not long after, upon the birth of Master McCullen’s and Miss Elizabeth’s first living child, a son named Mattie, Master McCullen directed young Nady to sing lullabies to their new baby each night before bed. But what began as innocent songs between children, blossomed into love—forbidden love—between adolescent Nady and Master Mattie.

For a while Nady enjoyed a life unknown to most enslaved people of her time. She traveled the south singing to audiences of white Southern elites, while taking lessons from her progressive French teacher Madam LaPierre. The “Singing Slave” they called her. She had the affection of her Master and the love of her Master’s son—a love she reciprocated. But as Nady’s mother warned her, "demons lurked for those who did not bind them." And poor Nady, she decided to wrestle with demons.

A sort of coming-of-age narrative, Lullaby by Consuelo Hamilton is a beautifully written story dripping with authentic emotion, both joy and sadness. Written from the perspective of a mother looking back on her life, the story is a reflection of the hard decisions in life and the even harder sacrifices. In the case of Nady, it’s about the desires of the heart while caught in a system of slavery where no choice is your own. For every joy in Nady’s life—for every gift of life, there is death. For every selfless, loving act, there is a resentful, hate-filled, heinous act. And even those, like Master McCullen, who are benevolent and generous, make choices that make the reader tremble. But then there are those, like Jaydith, who surprise and uplift the reader by going against their self-interest to make the right, noble choice. It’s this dichotomy of choice that brings out the real humanity of this story, regardless of the time period and circumstances.

The story is set before and during the American Civil War—with drastic threats to their way of life arising as the result of the attack on Fort Sumter—but outside of the dialect and general setting, readers will not find much specific historical figures or details. Lullaby is a literary fiction with touches of romance. The story is propelled by character. The POV is effective, and done quite well throughout most of the narrative. However, the story drifts as several other, sometimes startling, points of view are introduced in the second half of the novel. These POVs move away from Nady’s experience and toward those who are integral parts of Nady’s life. However, by introducing those points of view the author is able to deepen and broaden the story while also ramping up the stakes for what promises to be an equally captivating Book 2.

As Nady and everyone around her tries to escape reality, she comes to the realization that “sometimes it’s easier to dance with lies than to walk with truth.” That is the essence of this heartfelt tale. All of the characters—rich and poor, slave and free—must find a way through their own reality no matter what the truth may be.

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