Born on a plantation in Charles City, Virginia, Pheby Delores Brown has lived a relatively sheltered life. She'd been promised freedom on her eighteenth birthday, but instead of the idyllic life she imagined with her true love, Essex Henry, Pheby is forced to leave the only home she has ever known. Detained at the infamous Devil's Half Acre, a slave jail in Richmond, Virginia, Pheby will have to outwit her jailer, and she soon faces the ultimate sacrifice.

"This thought-provoking, well-paced tale brims with heart and intelligence."—NPR