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Lazaretto: A Novel
(OverDrive MP3 Audiobook, OverDrive Listen)

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HarperAudio 2016
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Description

Diane McKinney-Whetstone's nationally bestselling novel, Tumbling, immersed us into Philadelphia's black community during the Civil Rights era, and she returns to the city in this new historical novel about a cast of nineteenth-century characters whose colorful lives intersect at the legendary Lazaretto—America's first quarantine hospital.

Isolated on an island where two rivers meet, the Lazaretto quarantine hospital is the first stop for immigrants who wish to begin new lives in Philadelphia. The Lazaretto's black live-in staff forge a strong social community, and when one of them receives permission to get married on the island the mood is one of celebration, particularly since the white staff—save the opium-addicted doctor—are given leave for the weekend. On the eve of the ceremony, a gunshot rings out across the river. A white man has fired at a boat carrying the couple's friends and family to the island, and the captain is injured. His life lies in the hands of Sylvia, the Lazaretto's head nurse, who is shocked to realize she knows the patient.

Intertwined with the drama unfolding at the Lazaretto are the fates of orphan brothers. When one brother commits a crime to protect the other, he imperils both of their lives—and the consequences ultimately deliver both of them to the Lazaretto.

In this masterful work of historical fiction, Diane McKinney-Whetstone seamlessly transports us to Philadelphia in the aftermath of the Civil War and Lincoln's assassination, beautifully evoking powerful stories of love, friendship and humanity amid the vibrant black community that flourished amid the troubled times.

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Format:
OverDrive MP3 Audiobook, OverDrive Listen
Edition:
Unabridged
Street Date:
04/12/2016
Language:
English
ISBN:
9780062455574
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Citations
APA Citation (style guide)

Diane McKinney-Whetstone. (2016). Lazaretto: A Novel. Unabridged HarperAudio.

Chicago / Turabian - Author Date Citation (style guide)

Diane McKinney-Whetstone. 2016. Lazaretto: A Novel. HarperAudio.

Chicago / Turabian - Humanities Citation (style guide)

Diane McKinney-Whetstone, Lazaretto: A Novel. HarperAudio, 2016.

MLA Citation (style guide)

Diane McKinney-Whetstone. Lazaretto: A Novel. Unabridged HarperAudio, 2016.

Note! Citation formats are based on standards as of July 2022. Citations contain only title, author, edition, publisher, and year published. Citations should be used as a guideline and should be double checked for accuracy.
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Date Added:
Jun 12, 2018 15:41:11
Date Updated:
Oct 31, 2022 20:52:38
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Mar 24, 2024 07:01:24
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        The author of the critically acclaimed novels Tumbling, Tempest Rising, Blues Dancing, Leaving Cecil Street, and Trading Dreams at Midnight, Diane McKinney-Whetstone is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Black Caucus of the American Library Association's Literary Award for Fiction, which she won twice. She lives in Philadelphia with her husband. For more on Diane McKinney-Whetstone please visit www.mckinney-whetstone.com or follow her on Twitter @Dianemckwh.

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Lazaretto
fullDescription

Diane McKinney-Whetstone's nationally bestselling novel, Tumbling, immersed us into Philadelphia's black community during the Civil Rights era, and she returns to the city in this new historical novel about a cast of nineteenth-century characters whose colorful lives intersect at the legendary Lazaretto—America's first quarantine hospital.

Isolated on an island where two rivers meet, the Lazaretto quarantine hospital is the first stop for immigrants who wish to begin new lives in Philadelphia. The Lazaretto's black live-in staff forge a strong social community, and when one of them receives permission to get married on the island the mood is one of celebration, particularly since the white staff—save the opium-addicted doctor—are given leave for the weekend. On the eve of the ceremony, a gunshot rings out across the river. A white man has fired at a boat carrying the couple's friends and family to the island, and the captain is injured. His life lies in the hands of Sylvia, the Lazaretto's head nurse, who is shocked to realize she knows the patient.

Intertwined with the drama unfolding at the Lazaretto are the fates of orphan brothers. When one brother commits a crime to protect the other, he imperils both of their lives—and the consequences ultimately deliver both of them to the Lazaretto.

In this masterful work of historical fiction, Diane McKinney-Whetstone seamlessly transports us to Philadelphia in the aftermath of the Civil War and Lincoln's assassination, beautifully evoking powerful stories of love, friendship and humanity amid the vibrant black community that flourished amid the troubled times.

reviews
      • premium: True
      • source: AudioFile Magazine
      • content: The story of Sylvia, first a midwife, then a nurse, opens with the birth of Meda's baby in 1865 Philadelphia and continues through her life at Lazaretto, the quarantine island for new immigrants. Adenrele Ojo narrates with precision. Each word, every sentence is enunciated with care, drawing out the story to echo in listeners' ears. As head nurse for Lazaretto's black community, Sylvia becomes entangled in the lives of Meda's adopted sons and past lovers. Ojo delivers the scenes with exquisite tones that include dialogue in dialect. This slow-moving story is filled with music and relationships that weave in and out of the black and white, poor and rich communities of post-Civil War Philadelphia. M.B.K. © AudioFile 2016, Portland, Maine
      • premium: True
      • source: Publisher's Weekly
      • content:

        January 4, 2016
        Setting her book once again in her native city of Philadelphia, Pa., McKinney-Whetstone opens her sixth novel on the eve of Abraham Lincoln's assassination. Meda, a beautiful young black woman, delivers the secret child of her employer, lawyer Tom Benin (who is white), at a medical office for clandestine services. After the baby is taken from her at birth, Sylvie, an apprentice to the midwife, lies and tells Meda her infant girl has died. Bereft and ungrounded, Meda seeks consolation by serving as a wet nurse to a pair of white newborn boys at a nearby orphanage, naming them Bram and Linc after the slain president she admired. Through a deal with Benin, Bram and Linc are able to stay with Meda on weekends and holidays. After cruelty and abuse from their employer forces the boys from Philadelphia, Meda and her family continue to treat them as their own. In the meantime, Sylvia has become a formidable and capable nurse at the city's island quarantine hospital, Lazaretto. When the boys return to the city in desperate circumstances, old paths eventually converge at the hospital. McKinney-Whetstone explores racial passing, class prejudice, the nature of family, and the longings of forbidden love, but the disjointed narratives often feel like two separate novels uncomfortably forced together. The emotional content is never allowed to rise above predictable contrivances of plot and unremarkable characterizations.

      • premium: True
      • source: Library Journal
      • content:

        February 15, 2016

        From the moment Sylvia, a nurse-in-training, delivers Meda's baby and lies that the baby (fathered by her white employer) died, the two African American women remain connected through the years, although they belong to different social circles. The light-skinned baby, named Linc after the just-assassinated President Lincoln, is secretly delivered to an orphanage, where a grieving Meda cares for him and another orphaned infant, Bram. Raised as impoverished whites, Linc and Bram grow up among African Americans whose lives appear full of love which, as outsiders, the boys don't feel entitled to themselves. In the climactic second half of the novel, the various story lines come together in a tragicomic series of events at Lazaretto--the city's quarantine hospital out on an island, where Sylvia lives and works--including a life-threatening gunshot wound, a wedding, bounty hunters, as well as love lost and found. VERDICT Themes of racial and family identity are threaded into the author's (Trading Dreams at Midnight) fast-paced historical about the connected lives of working African Americans in Philadelphia in the years after the Civil War. [See Prepub Alert, 10/19/15.]--Laurie Cavanaugh, Holmes P.L., Halifax, MA

        Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

      • premium: True
      • source: Library Journal
      • content:

        May 15, 2016

        On the night of Abraham Lincoln's assassination, nurse Sylvia delivers a baby in Philadelphia. The newborn is the child of Meda, a black woman, and her white employer. Though born alive, the baby is pronounced dead by the father. The haunting events of the birth intertwine the lives and communities of Sylvia and Meda. VERDICT Readers of Lalita Tademy will embrace the vibrant characters in McKinney-Whetstone's unforgettable novel. (LJ 2/15/16)

        Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

      • premium: True
      • source: Library Journal
      • content:

        November 15, 2015

        Winner of the Black Caucus of the American Library Association's Literary Award for Fiction for Trading Dreams at Midnight, McKinney-Whetstone returns with a historical set in 19th-century Philadelphia, telling the story of the black live-in staff at Lazaretto, built in 1799 and the first quarantine hospital in the United States.

        Copyright 2015 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

      • premium: True
      • source: Kirkus
      • content:

        March 1, 2016
        McKinney-Whetstone's sixth novel (Trading Dreams at Midnight, 2008, etc.) explores a fateful shooting that rocks the close-knit African-American community surrounding the Lazaretto Hospital in post-Civil War Philadelphia. On the night of Lincoln's assassination, a black maid named Meda is rushed to the office of local midwife Dr. Miss by Tom Benin, her white boss and father of her child. It's the first birth that Sylvia, the assisting nurse-in-training, has attended. So when Benin tells Dr. Miss that he'll be taking the baby and Meda must be told the baby has died, Sylvia is understandably shaken. The question of who can retain control over his or her own body becomes central to the narrative. As one of the few doctors serving blacks in 1865, Dr. Miss was able to provide much-needed health care for the community as well as training for aspiring black nurses like Sylvia; however, the hierarchy of racial power dynamics still permeated every aspect of their work. In haunting, vivid language, Meda's breasts overflow with milk as she mourns the newborn she was never able to hold in her arms. Language sings throughout the whole of McKinney-Whetstone's writing--from the lilt of her characters' colloquial speech to her poetic, visceral descriptions. Meda's and Sylvia's lives continue to intertwine through their roles as surrogate mothers--Meda to Lincoln and Abraham, two orphaned boys Benin sends her to look after; Sylvia to her cousin Vergie. But after Lincoln and Abraham are assaulted by a powerful man and forced to flee Philadelphia, all these lives intersect when a quarantine shuts down Lazaretto Hospital and decades-old secrets finally come to light. A sophisticated and compelling novel that comes alive through a rich cavalcade of vibrant characters and a suspenseful plot.

        COPYRIGHT(2016) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

      • premium: True
      • source: Booklist
      • content:

        Starred review from February 1, 2016
        Opening in Philadelphia on the eve of Lincoln's assassination and ending over two decades later, McKinney-Whetstone's (Trading Dreams at Midnight, 2008) vibrant historical novel traces the lives of several intertwined families as they navigate the early years of Reconstruction. A young, black servant arrives at the midwife's too late for the abortion her white employer, the father of the child, had hoped for. She is told the baby died, but the midwife's assistant secretly spirits the infant boy away to a nearby orphanage, where another boy soon arrives. The two are raised as brothers, the bond between them growing ever stronger over the years as they endure mistreatment by both white superiors and blacks fueled by jealousy of their near-white appearance. The scene then shifts to Lazaretto, a hospital on an island near Philadelphia, where immigrants are quarantined. Mourning the loss of their surrogate mother and fleeing the wrath of the family of a man who abused them, the brothers reunite in the final pages of this latest of McKinney-Whetstone's completely engaging novels, a unique blend of poetic language and graphic depictions of the injustices suffered by African Americans in the postCivil War period.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)

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shortDescription

Diane McKinney-Whetstone's nationally bestselling novel, Tumbling, immersed us into Philadelphia's black community during the Civil Rights era, and she returns to the city in this new historical novel about a cast of nineteenth-century characters whose colorful lives intersect at the legendary Lazaretto—America's first quarantine hospital.

Isolated on an island where two rivers meet, the Lazaretto quarantine hospital is the first stop for immigrants who wish to begin new lives in Philadelphia. The Lazaretto's black live-in staff forge a strong social community, and when one of them receives permission to get married on the island the mood is one of celebration, particularly since the white staff—save the opium-addicted doctor—are given leave for the weekend. On the eve of the ceremony, a gunshot rings out across the river. A white man has fired at a boat carrying the couple's friends and family to the island, and the captain is injured. His life lies in...

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      • description: Fiction / African American & Black / Historical