The narrator Sarny is an appealing heroine. She is twelve, just on the verge of womanhood. She immediately engages the reader's sympathy because of her unhappy lot and the reader's admiration for her plucky perseverance. She is rumored unfairly to be a witch because a "stuck tongue" makes her odd. She is without parents because her "birthing mammy" was sold away and Clay Waller may be her father. She resists her lot as a slave by harboring rebellious thoughts against her masters. A quiet girl, she is always thinking. She has a keen eye for the realities of the cruel world that imprisons her. She finds that learning to read and write—the best way to can contribute to her own freedom and to her people's liberation—comes easily. Hungrily she seeks out the knowledge Nightjohn holds.

Alice and Mammy show how...