Ajeemah and His Son

With its very first line--``That wiping out of Atu and Sisi's wedding was always going to be one of the painful happenings''--this poignant narrative takes on the age-old voice of a folktale. On their way to present a dowry of gold to Sisi's parents, Ajeemah and his son Atu, the groom-to-be, are kidnapped, sold to slave traders and taken to Jamaica, where they are sold to different white estate-owners. From the onset of their new lives, both Ajeemah and Atu are determined not only to escape but to wreak revenge upon the slaveholders as well. Despite the similarity of their plans, father and son end up with quite different fates. This tale, though brief, is packed with details of a slave's frustrating and demeaning life; for the most part, Berry's ( A Thief in His Village ) prose incorporates this information seamlessly. Occasionally, however, the novel's overall simplicity is vitiated by sentences, as well as snippets of dialogue, that would seem more at home in a textbook. Ages 12-up. (Oct.)