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The Farming of Bones

4.03 of 5 stars 4.03 · rating details · 3,270 ratings · 339 reviews

The Farming of Bones begins in 1937 in a village on the Dominican side of the river that separates the country from Haiti. Amabelle Desir, Haitian-born and a faithful maidservant to the Dominican family that took her in when she was orphaned, and her lover Sebastien, an itinerant sugarcane cutter, decide they will marry and return to Haiti at the end of the cane season. Ho...more

Paperback, 312 pages

Published September 1st 1999 by Penguin Books (first published 1997)

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Breath, Eyes, Memory by Edwidge Danticat

In the Time of the Butterflies by Julia Alvarez

The Farming of Bones by Edwidge Danticat

Caribbean/West Indian Diaspora Literature - Women

4th out of 130 books — 37 voters

Island Beneath the Sea by Isabel Allende

Caribbean Literature

3rd out of 227 books — 60 voters

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Mar 16, 2009 Dusty Myers rated it 2 of 5 stars

A diasporic novel in line with Coetzee's The Life and Times of Michael K and McCarthy's The Road. Which is to say, it follows people trying to escape turmoil, in this case Amabelle and other Haitian workers as they try to escape the Dominican Republic during the "Parsley massacre" of 1937—called such due to the shibboleth used by the Dominican soldiers to determine a person's heritage. (They'd hold up a sprig of parsley and ask, "What is this?" and if you answered in the Haitian Creole, you died...more

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Sep 03, 2007 Jen Fordyce rated it 4 of 5 stars

This one is keeping me awake at night. It is beautiful, even in anguish.

(later)

Ok, I finished. While I was waiting to get on an airplane at 9 a.m. I was waiting in line and reading and crying and handing the airline man my boarding pass and crying and finding a seat between these two nice ladies and crying. It was so sad...but also lovely.

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Sep 19, 2008 Savvy rated it 5 of 5 stars

Sad, but stunningly beautiful, FARMING OF THE BONES is a powerfully written evocative account of the horror of the genocide committed in 1937 against poor Haitian cane workers and others by the Dominican General Rafael Trujillo.

Through the voice of a young orphaned Haitian woman, Amabelle Desir, we follow the lives of desperate Haitian exiles working the Dominican cane fields in deplorable conditions with paltry wages and sparse living conditions.

Danticat is a master storyteller and her prose...more

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May 23, 2009 Jeanette rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: all-fiction, caribbean, historical-fiction

Two-point-five stars
This book really wants to be "literary" fiction, but it lacks the necessary warmth and depth. The characters are flat and underdeveloped, such that it's hard to feel sorrow for their suffering. The only way I could work up any kind of caring was to remind myself that these characters had real-life counterparts who did in fact suffer the atrocities inflicted by Trujillo.
The author seems to assume a lot of prior knowledge on the part of the reader about the events portrayed. T...more

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Jun 07, 2012 Lex rated it 2 of 5 stars

Recommended to Lex by: English professor

Amabella is a Haitian servant for a Spanish family in the Dominican Republic in 1937. She is in love with Sebastien, the sugar cane cutter. She doesn't mind serving Senora Valencia and her husband, an army colonel. Her only ghost is the violent death of her parents, deaths that she watched at a very young age as they were swept away in the Massacre River. But change is on the way. The Generalissimo wants the horrid Haitians out of his country and back across the river from where they came! The p...more Amabella is a Haitian servant for a Spanish family in the Dominican Republic in 1937. She is in love with Sebastien, the sugar cane cutter. She doesn't mind serving Senora Valencia and her husband, an army colonel. Her only ghost is the violent death of her parents, deaths that she watched at a very young age as they were swept away in the Massacre River. But change is on the way. The Generalissimo wants the horrid Haitians out of his country and back across the river from where they came! The persecution begins, and Amabelle tries to escape from the country where she has grown up to return to her roots. But, she loses Sebastien along the way. Is he alive? Will they find each other? Why can't Dominicans and Haitians tolerate one another, their major difference being how they say certain words? Parsley.
Danticat does an amazing job describing the horrible persecutions and murders of the Haitians during this turbulent time. However, her climax is... well, anticlimactic and leaves the reader with nothing but long drawn out passages about realization and acceptance of what has happened. The book could have ended several times but is instead drawn out for what seems like eternity as Amabelle grows older and less enjoyable.
In the beginning, there are amazing passages in between the narrative dialogue chapters of precious, private moments between Amabelle and Sebastien. Once the action begins and the Haitians are being slaughtered, those moments go away, and the heart of the book is lost. I wish Danticat had kept those going because they were beautiful, peaceful moments to bring the reader back to this deep character that is Amabelle.
Also, the ending brought everything back together. The last chapter is moving and unpredictable in a sad way. Amabelle's obsession with water comes full circle in the end that leaves the reader feeling as ghost-like and un-whole as Amabelle must have felt since the massacres.
I recommend this book for older audiences who can appreciate the history and the pain. But, the middle can be and should be skipped.(less)

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Mar 11, 2012 Monique rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: books-read-in-2012, book-club-reads, favorites

I read The Farming of Bones in one day. The story was compelling, the characters engaging, and the writing was prefect. Danticat had me hooked all the way through. An added plus was that it is historical fiction, my favorite genre.

The Farming of Bones takes place during Rafael Trujillo reign of power in the Dominican Republic. Personally, I know very little about the Dominican Republic and it history. Most of what I know about this period I learned form The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Ju...more I read The Farming of Bones in one day. The story was compelling, the characters engaging, and the writing was prefect. Danticat had me hooked all the way through. An added plus was that it is historical fiction, my favorite genre.

The Farming of Bones takes place during Rafael Trujillo reign of power in the Dominican Republic. Personally, I know very little about the Dominican Republic and it history. Most of what I know about this period I learned form The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz, which I read back in 2009. The Farming of Bones, gave me another chance to learn about this moment in history and from the view point of a foreigner living in the Dominican Republic during the unrest. I could help about shuffle through my memory every now and again to remember bits and pieces of Diaz's novel and what I learned there to apply to this one. It was interesting to learn about the discrimination that Haitian workers experienced in the Dominican Republic, the history of the conflict between Haiti and the DR, as well the Massacre of 1937. This information along with the characters, their backstories and Danticat's writing style combined lead to a real page turner.

I can't say that I liked one character more than another. They were all so well developed and thought out. The author could give you glimpses into the each characters background and what brought them to this moment in time. This made me keep turning pages to find out more about them and what fate had in store for them. The main character, Amabelle was the most flushed out (of course) and her story was heartbreaking at times (most of the time). I found myself rooting for her and hoping that by the time I got to the last page she would finally find even a little bit of happiness and peace. Her story did not end the way that I had hoped, but it felt right. I didn't find myself second guessing, there was no "What? Where did that come from?" moment. Danticat's choices for Amabelle (or any of the characters) were very much in line with the way the story was going, no surprise illogical twist.

The writing style was amazing. That is the only way that I can describe it. One of my favorite passages:

I will say that for me the end was a little unsatisfying. I felt that Danticat tried to wrap everything up with a bow. The ending seemed a little rushed to me and did not as nicely together with the story as the rest of the parts. In this case, there are somethings that I wish she had left me to wonder about. (less)

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Dec 12, 2011 Ensiform rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, haiti, historical

In 1937, Amabelle, an orphaned Haitian woman working in the Dominican Republic, dreams of returning to Haiti with her lover Sebastien, a sugarcane cutter (the scar-inflicting “bones” of the title). Instead, they are both caught up in the racist anti-immigrant furor stirred up Trujillo, and the killing, which will be latter be known as the Parsley Massacre, or El Corte, begins. Amabelle flees, separated from Sebastien, and tries to forge a new life that is nothing like the one she dreamed of.

This...more

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Aug 11, 2011 Aleeda rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Historical fiction is probably my favorite genre of book. Setting fictional (and some non-fictional) characters in story with a backdrop of chronoligcal events takes quite a bit of imagination. As much as I think I know about a subject, these intimate peeks into these historical events add even more to my knowledge. Edwidge Danticat draws on not only her life, but stories relayed to her by family members, weaving stories of Haitian life into her fiction. The story of the 1937 Massacre ( has Ms.D...more

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Jun 10, 2011 Barbara rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: historical-fiction

In this chilling novel, set in the Dominican Republic and Haiti in 1937, Edwidge Danticat tells the story of Amabelle, a Haitian child rescued on the day her parents drowned in the river separating the Dominican Republic and Haiti . She has spent her life in the Dominican Republic with the family who saved her. The young woman of the family is married to an officer in Trujillo's army, and though Amabelle is loved by those who rescued her, she realizes that the situation in the country is becomin...more

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Feb 08, 2011 AdultFiction Teton County Library rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, historical-fiction

TETON CO LIBRARY CALL NO: F DANTICAT
Marisa's rating: 3 stars

Interesting, if not haunting novel by Haitian-American Edwidge Danticat. The plot surrounds the 1937 massacre of 17,000 Haitians living in the Dominican Republic - ordered by the then dictator, Trujillo. The main character, Amabelle, is conflicted as she is forced to leave her love, Sebestien behind to escape back to Haiti. While Amabelle begins the novel as naive, she is forced to see the harsh reality of the world around her - not onl...more

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Aug 11, 2010 Hillary rated it 3 of 5 stars

"I close the door and lock out the tame night breeze that barely reaches my bare body, naked because Sebastien has made me believe that it is like a prayer to lie unclothed alone the way one came out of the womb, but mostly because I am hoping to feel the sweat gather between the cement floor and the hollow in my back, so that when I rise up, there will be a flood of perspiration to roll down over my buttocks, down the front and back and between my thighs, down to my knees, shins, ankles, and to...more "I close the door and lock out the tame night breeze that barely reaches my bare body, naked because Sebastien has made me believe that it is like a prayer to lie unclothed alone the way one came out of the womb, but mostly because I am hoping to feel the sweat gather between the cement floor and the hollow in my back, so that when I rise up, there will be a flood of perspiration to roll down over my buttocks, down the front and back and between my thighs, down to my knees, shins, ankles, and toes, so there will not be a drop of liquid left in me with which to cry."

"Que diga mor? Love? Hate? Speak to me of things the world has yet to truly understand, of the instant meaning of each bird's call, of a child's secret thoughts in her mother's womb, of the measured rhythmical time of every man and woman's breath, of the true colors of the inside of the moon, of the larger miracles in small things, the deeper mysteries."

"I was saving my smile for when you needed it...I didn't want you to think that love was not scarce, because it is, that it flowed freely from everywhere, or that was something you could expect without price from everyone."

"I will never be a whole woman for the absence of your face." - "Your mother was never as far from you as you supposed. You were like my shadow. Always fled when I came to you and only followed when I left you alone. You will be well again, ma belle, Amabelle. I know this to be true. And how can you have ever doubted my love? You, my eternity."

"You may be surprised what we use our dreams to do, how we drape them over our sight and carry them like amulets to protect us from evil spells."

"It took more than prayers to heal me after the slaughter...It took holding a pretty and gentle wife and three new lives against my chest. I wept so much when they arrested me. I wept all the time I was in prison. I wept at the border. I wept for everyone who was touched, beaten, or killed. It took a love closer to the earth, closer to my own body, to stop my tears. Perhaps I have lost, but I have also gained an even greater understanding of things both godly and earthly."

"I knew very well, from the memory of it as it was once carved into my younger face: I will bear anything, carry any load, suffer any shame, walk with eyes to the ground, if only for the very small chance that one day our fates might come to being somewhat closer and I would be granted for all my years of travail and duty an honestly gained life that in some extremely modest way would begin to resemble hers."(less)

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Jun 06, 2010 David Shin rated it 5 of 5 stars

The Farming of Bones. By Edwidge Danticat. 310 pp. New York: Penguin Books. $14.

Hope On the Edge of Death

Death, struggles, love, birth, misery, happiness—one word cannot capture the flurry of emotions and issues that Edwidge Danticat brings forth in one novel. Danticat’s, The Farming of Bones is both compelling and surprisingly a fast read at the same time.

The book is mainly about the struggles of a young woman during the 1937 massacre. A Haitian woman living in the Republic, the protagonist Ama...more The Farming of Bones. By Edwidge Danticat. 310 pp. New York: Penguin Books. $14.

Hope On the Edge of Death

Death, struggles, love, birth, misery, happiness—one word cannot capture the flurry of emotions and issues that Edwidge Danticat brings forth in one novel. Danticat’s, The Farming of Bones is both compelling and surprisingly a fast read at the same time.

The book is mainly about the struggles of a young woman during the 1937 massacre. A Haitian woman living in the Republic, the protagonist Amabelle is living a love story, worthy of the big screens. She is serving a Dominican family, so far content with her life and her love Sebastian although her past was marked with the death of her parents. She is fairly content with her life, but hell comes to earth as the massacre begins. The story takes a few surprising twists, and not surprisingly, many Haitians die.

The setting is mainly situated in the Dominican-Republic, the year is 1937. The relations between Haitians and Dominicans in the borderlands are tense. With racial prejudice and accusations of Haitians stealing and dominating the Dominican Republic, Dominican President Rafael Trujillo initiates a campaign ordering the slaughter of what is estimated to be 20 to 30,000 Haitians. This became what is known as the notorious 1937 massacre, or the Parsley Massacre, with various novels such as General Sun my Brother, by Jacques Stephen Alexis influenced by this event. Danticat is known to have been influenced by Alexis, and so further reading of this type is directed toward Alexis. The book begins before the actual massacre, but the climax of the book is situated and results from the 1937 massacre.

Danticat’s novel does not go into much historical depth, and the reader is forced to research the history of the conflict between Haiti and Dominican-Republic, to get a better contextual understanding of the novel. Needless to say, that is one aspect of the novel that makes it such a fast, yet compelling read. With characters risen from the time period of the massacre, one gets a huge understanding of what actually might have occurred, something history cannot reveal. With historical facts and statistics, the personal aspects of the individuals themselves get lost. However, Danticat allows for the characters to breathe life, each with their own faults and worries, and this is ultimately the strength of Danticat’s novel. Uniquely, Danticat tells the history through the character’s of the book, making the past seem all too real.

What I found particularly appealing about this book, is not only its engaging read, but the many thematic elements that are brought forth. For one, the idea of hope in the midst of death. Since the beginning, Amabelle has had internal conflicts within herself. Particularly she has flashbacks of the past, dreams and memories that come to haunt her. Amongst the many themes that arise, I feel like the book was unveiling that the life we have now is very limited and fragile. Even with the best of circumstances, life can vanish—but there must be something we can hold onto. Without revealing too much of the plot, this idea becomes more pronounced as the story carries on. How does one choose to live in a world where everyone around them is brutally slaughtered? This question is not easily answered, and the title The Farming of Bones alludes to this slaughter, but there are many different interpretations of the title. Throughout the novel Danticat seems to be writing on the premise of hope. Amabelle sees hope, the possibly that some of the people she knew did not die. With that hope, Amabelle awaits in Haiti, after she flees from the Dominican-Republic, until the years waste away. This idea of hope speaks volumes, and the novel becomes relevant even now, when it is set in the 1930s.

At first the book may seem too simple with its literary style and or content—not much symbolism, metaphors, etc. But simply put, that is Danticat’s style, and as you continue to read, the style does the book enormous justice. And although the historical aspect of this novel is not particularly concrete or solid, the issues that are revealed made this read something I do not regret in the least.

By David Shin
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Apr 16, 2010 Giedra rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: juvenile-fiction

This was like Gabriel Garcia Marquez-lite. It reminded me a lot of Love in teh Time of Cholera, but was a much easier and enjoyable read (much less philosophical). Very sad subject matter--deals with Haitians living in the Dominican Republic in the 1930s, who mostly work as domestics and in the cane fields (although some are wealthier), and how they were forced to go back to Haiti by the threat of violence under the dictatorship of "the Generalissimo" (Trujillo). Many Haitians died trying to eva...more

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Aug 07, 2009 Kate rated it 5 of 5 stars

The Haitian workers in the Dominican Republic of this story are socially and linguistically marked. As immigrants, their language is a source of scorn, and their lives and stories have no bearing in the colonial world the Spanish have built. What, then, do they have but their bodies as evidence of their existence? The author provides a markedly physical account of an underrepresented historical event. Her title references the slave-like physical abuse of a marginalized people and the backbreakin...more

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Mar 19, 2013 Sinai rated it 4 of 5 stars

This book has such a boatload of meaning and just...it was so painful to read because of how into the story I was. This is just, not a happy book. But it was beautiful--I was a bit lost on the history, but I pieced things together. As a Spanish speaker, I found the mixture of Kreyol (I think that's the language) and Spanish was very effective and gave the book a more realistic way of reading. I liked that the characters were multi-sided, as people are in real life. Amabelle is not my favorite he...more

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Sep 15, 2012 Jie Wen rated it 5 of 5 stars

Jie Wen
Due date: 9/6/12
Humanities

The book I choose to read was The Farming of Bones by Edwidge Danticat. I choose this book out of the others on the list because while researching about this book, it interest me that it will be about Haiti and the Dominican Republic. I have always wanted to learn more about what is happening in Haiti and in the Dominican Republic. I researched that Haitians are being persecuted and killed. I also wanted to learn more about Trujillo who was a dictator and was t...more Jie Wen
Due date: 9/6/12
Humanities

The book I choose to read was The Farming of Bones by Edwidge Danticat. I choose this book out of the others on the list because while researching about this book, it interest me that it will be about Haiti and the Dominican Republic. I have always wanted to learn more about what is happening in Haiti and in the Dominican Republic. I researched that Haitians are being persecuted and killed. I also wanted to learn more about Trujillo who was a dictator and was the president of the Dominican Republic. This is why I choose this book out of the others on the list.
While reading this book, I learned that Amabelle Desir is a Haitian. Her parents drown in the flooded Massacre River. Then she became a housemaid to Don Ignacio who was a Dominican. Don Ignacio's daughter was Valencia and Valencia gave birth to twins but her son died early. She named her daughter Rosalinda. Valencia's husband was Senor Pico, a Dominican army officer. I also learned that Trujillo (the president of the Dominican Republic) wanted all Haitians to be killed. Amabelle's lover, Sebastian who was a sugarcane cutter disappeared when the Dominicans army started killing Haitians. They assume that people who could not pronounced perejil were Haitians. Many Haitians are forced to jump off cliffs before they cross the border to Haitian. The quote, "They don't promise you money." His voice staggered between high and low, as though he were beginning to think that I might really be asleep. "They're collecting tales for newspapers and radio men. The Generalissimo has found ways to buy and sell the ones here. Even this region has been corrupted with his money." (p.246). This quote shows that Trujillo is very cruel. Many people died during this Massacre. This is what I learned from reading this book.
After reading this book, I made a text to text connection to the book, In the Times of the Butterflies by Julia Alvarez. Both of these books talk about Trujillo being cruel. Bothe books talk about Trujillo having power over other people. Many people died because of Trujillo. The Mirabel sister died except for Dede who was the only survivor. Haitians were being killed and persecuted. Both of these books shows people dying. This is why this book is related to In the Times of the Butterflies.
There are many take aways from this book. Some take aways are Haitians were being killed and persecuted. They are forced to jump of cliffs. Another take away is that people who could not pronounced perejil were Haitians. The last take away is that many people died and Trujillo is a dictator.
There are not a lot of questions I have after reading this book. One question is why do they assume that people who could not pronounced perejil were Haitians? What does perejil mean?
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Aug 08, 2011 Teri rated it 5 of 5 stars

I know about the tragic historical event that features prominently in this novel, so i am reading it with trepidation, gritting my teeth, as it were, because slaughter is always awful. Yet, when Danticat read from some of her work and spoke to us AP English readers in Louisville in June, i liked her so much as an individual, i wanted to read more of her work. Her writing is poetic, lively with Haitian patois and atmosphere and culture, more so in this novel than in some of her other work.

So far,...more

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Apr 13, 2013 Crépuscule121 rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

„Die süße Saat der Tränen“ von Edwidge Danticat war für mich eher untypisch.
Es war ein Spontankauf – ich war selbst von mir überrascht – da der Titel nun wirklich alles andere als anziehend ist (im Englischen kommt das Buch mit „The Farming of Bones“ übrigens deutlich besser bei weg). Außerdem ziehen mich politische Konflikte in Büchern keineswegs an und von Haiti wusste ich so ziemlich nichts.
Doch ich muss sagen, dass ich positiv überrascht war und im Nachhinein froh, es doch gekauft und gelese...more

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Jan 14, 2008 Jen rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2008-read, historical-fiction, fiction, war-related

I had no idea there'd been a Haitian genocide, so this book was good for me as a history lesson. I like how Dandicat gives us glimpses into both cultures before the Massacre. As for the Massacre, she gives enough detail so we get the gruesome picture, but does not hammer the reader with graphic descriptions, as some books do. She tells her story simply but effectively.

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Apr 15, 2012 Alexandra Jacobs rated it 5 of 5 stars

Edwidge Danticat’s The Farming of Bones presents the most affecting and evocative 1st person narrative I have read in recent memory, if not ever. Danticat’s book tells the story of one woman who survives the Dominican massacre of Haitian migrants in the late 1930s. Unlike any fictitious account of an atrocity that I have read, this book forces its reader to sit uncomfortably with the weight of true grief, while simultaneously building a character whose voice is so close to true human consciousne...more Edwidge Danticat’s The Farming of Bones presents the most affecting and evocative 1st person narrative I have read in recent memory, if not ever. Danticat’s book tells the story of one woman who survives the Dominican massacre of Haitian migrants in the late 1930s. Unlike any fictitious account of an atrocity that I have read, this book forces its reader to sit uncomfortably with the weight of true grief, while simultaneously building a character whose voice is so close to true human consciousness.
At the beginning of the novel, the voice of Amabelle is both intimate and far away, like a person who does not yet truly know themselves. Danticat’s most powerful tool is her use of verb tenses. Amabelle’s thoughts meander from the past, heavy with memories of her dead parents, to the present, to the future—weaving together to create the voice of a character who is constantly trying to survive amidst the overwhelming power of grief.
Danticat also masterfully handles the transformation of Amabelle from a faithful servant for a rich family to an ambivalent migrant, aware and resentful of the embedded inequities in her environment. Danticat allows her reader to travel this journey alongside Amabelle by never making us privy to Amabelle’s implicit judgments, that which remain sub-conscious for any individual. Instead, we hear the voices of Amabelle’s peers and loved ones and how their perspectives, along with circumstances, slowly turn Amabelle away from her life “working for others.” Highlighted throughout this transformation is Amabelle’s concern with ownership. At the beginning of the book she does not hesitate to use “ours” when discussing her employer’s newborn babies. But she also points out, “Nearly everything I had was something Senora Valencia had once owned and no longer wanted. Everything except Sebastien.” Her simmering excitement about someone to call her own is something she does not know how to declare—this is a voice she lacks. Danticat shows us this when Sebastien calls into question her affiliation with the family. When she tells him that they are the closest thing to kin she has, he asks where he stands. She says: “ ‘You too,’ I said, wanting to announce that he came first.
Danticat is also able to construct a narrative that is constantly reverberating against itself. As Amabelle’s resentment towards her employer rises, so does the tension surrounding the death of Joel, a fellow cane worker who was a friend of Sebastien. The loss of Joel connects with the less recent loss of Amabelle’s parents. When the Senora’s baby dies Amabelle says: “Somehow I envied her. At least she could place her hands on it, her son’s final bed. My parents had no coffins.” Danticat gives us no more than this but with this sentence we feel the loss of Joel as well as Amabelle’s parents. We feel the pain in having no resting place for loved ones, both in Amabelle, but also in Joel’s father, Kongo.
Danticat’s near flawless rendition of a 1st person narrative continues as Amabelle struggles to live without Sebastien. The lack of any distant or omniscient narration makes Sebastien’s physical absence from the story very visceral for the reader. I literally felt Amabelle’s pain. When Amabelle first hears that several people claim to have witnessed his death, the news is unspeakably painful, and Danticat’s presentation echoes this. Instead of drowning us in a verbal outpouring of grief, Amabelle simply watches a “line of bare-chested young men” working at the docks. Once again, the novel reverberates against itself, taking us back to Amabelle’s loving descriptions of Sebastien’s virile body. We know that she sees Sebastien in these men, because we see Sebastien in these men.
Danticat’s ability to envelop the reader into this harrowing narrative does not stop with Amabelle’s personal story. The massacre is historically known as the “Parsley Massacre” because of General Trujillo focus on the way Haitians pronounced the Spanish word for parsley. Danticat establishes parsley as a theme that is rooted in the customs and identity of the Haitian migrants long before the massacre begins: “We used pesi, perejil, parsley…we savored for our food, our teas, our baths, to clean our insides as well as our outsides of old aches and griefs, to shed a passing year’s dust as a new one dawned, to wash a new infant’s hair for the first time and—along with boiled orange leaves—a corpse’s remains one final time.” Danticat establishes parsley as an essential aspect of Haitians’ daily lives. This makes it all the more searing to revisit the use of parsley among Haitians after its use as a racist weapon: “Was it because it was so used, so commonplace, so abundantly at hand that everyone who desired a sprig could find one? We used parsley for our food, our teas, our baths, to clean our insides as as well as our outsides. Perhaps the Generalissimo in some larger order was trying to do the same for his country.” Danticat’s treatment of parsley encapsulates the dehumanizing qualities of violence fuelled by racism. She highlights the universality of parsley, its common place among both Haitians and Dominicans, and then shows us the numb shock a Haitian feels when this simple fact of life is used to separate them, devalue them, and kill them.

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Oct 05, 2011 Layla Strohl rated it 4 of 5 stars

I bought this book from a guy on the street for a $1. It had no cover and no description except for a handwritten inscription which read, "Ben, know I am your Amabelle and you my Sebastian. Here's to holding on tight in the middle of the night. I love you, Sarah".

Being a complete sucker for open declarations of love, I bought the book.

Farming for Bones is absolutely not at all the sappy love story I thought it would be. It is a beautifully written story that follows a group of Haitians through...more

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Jun 30, 2011 Marcy rated it 5 of 5 stars

Haitians who live in the Dominican Republic, farmers cutting sugar cane, women servants, loyal to their masters...Amabelle, one of those women, her parents drowned in the river, taken as an orphan to befriend and serve Senora Valencia, the wife of an army colonel who honors and fights for Generalissimo Trujillo, president of the republic. Amabelle loves a sugar cane cutter. The Dominican soldiers and civilians make war upon the Haitians. In the Great Massacre, Amabelle's love of her life dies, a...more

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Aug 20, 2009 Mera Sivanesan rated it 3 of 5 stars

Danticat lays bare the little-known Parsley Massacre of 1937 in the Dominican Republic (where between 20 to 30 thousand Haitians were slaughtered under the orders of the Dominican President) through the eyes of Amabelle, a Haitian servant to Dominican sugar plantation owners.

Danticat has a poet's way with words but her prose is direct - you get the sense that she's gone over her manuscript repeatedly with a fine tooth comb, getting rid of all excess in the writing. The only problem with this is...more

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Apr 04, 2010 Katy rated it 4 of 5 stars

The Farming of Bones traces the life of a Haitian servant living in the Dominican Republic in 1937, the year of the tragic massacre of thousands of Haitians in the border river between the two countries. the protagonist, Amabelle, tries to flee and is captured and tortured, and lives the rest of her life finding peace amongst the turmoil that the massacre resulted in.

This work has been my favorite that I've read thus far for this class. Perhaps because I am especially interested in the subject...more

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Oct 28, 2010 Mordena rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is a lovely book about horrible things. Beautiful, evocative, thought-provoking, it shows people who have been living side by side erupting into violence and genocide. This is really more like 4 1/2 stars for me -- withholding the last half-star because the main character is a little bit of a blank. I completely understand why -- her past is taken away from her, she has no family and nothing to root her in life. Still, it made the reading experience just a little bit removed. I probably wou...more

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Jul 18, 2011 J rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: avid-reader-recommendations, read-in-2010

(FROM JACKET)It is 1937, a dangerous year in the Dominican Republic, where Haitian laborers are useful, rather than welcome; tolerated, but not trusted. Amabelle, a young Haitian woman orphaned at the age of eight, is a faithful servant to the young wife of an army colonel, living n the household where the two women grew up together. Amabelle's lover Sebastien is an itinerant sugarcane cytter, a handsome man despite the scars on his face, the calluses on his hands.
There are rumors that in other...more

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Aug 08, 2011 Tony J added it

Shelves: fiction

This was one of those books that I started and couldn't figure out *why* I kept reading. While it got off to a slow start, I later realized that much of what Danticat wrote about was setting up the state of events in the Dominican Republic before the slaughter of many Haitian laborers.

The story follows the life of Amabelle, a Haitian house servant for a wealthy Dominican family, who is in love with a cane worker named Sebastien. When the slaughter starts, though, they're separated and Amabelle'...more

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Jan 04, 2012 Matthew Hunter rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: favorites, united-statsian-literature

Perfection. From the introductory quote of the "shibboleth" passage in the Bible, through the Parsley Massacre in the Dominican Republic, to the frantic return to Haiti, this book is history, tragedy, thriller, and inspiring story all wrapped into one. Haitian American Edwidge Danticat knows how to weave a soulful tale. I read this book before traveling to Haiti with a joint medical/divinity school team from Duke University. If you're traveling to Haiti and want to better understand the nation's...more

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Sep 28, 2011 Mr. Woodnal rated it 3 of 5 stars

This intensely sad piece of historical fiction centers on the bloody 1930s genocide of Haitian workers in the sugar cane fields of the Dominican Republic. While much of the story lacks a central unifying focus and Danticat's lyrical prose is at times soporific, the final sixty pages provide a swiftly paced resolution for what precedes them. This final portion of the novel isn't enough to provide the heart and soul that fill Breath, Eyes, Memory, but Danticat's voice is still an important one in...more

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Jul 14, 2011 Topher rated it 3 of 5 stars

Read this book in Zambia and gave it to a teacher at Chikumbuso to read. It is a sad book about genocide in Haiti and the DR. The characters suffer and make choices that hardly seem possible. Through it all, though, the book makes a strong case for the seemingly collateral damage of hatred that actually is the primary devestation. Many parallels between the poor of Haiti and the poor of Africa. When you boil it all down (even though there is no history of genocide in Zambia, there is many exampl...more

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About Edwidge Danticat

Edwidge Danticat was born in Haiti and moved to the United States when she was twelve. She is the author of several books, including Breath, Eyes, Memory, an Oprah Book Club selection; Krik? Krak!, a National Book Award finalist; and The Farming of Bones, an American Book Award winner. She is also the editor of The Butterfly's Way: Voices from the Haitian Dyaspora in the United States and The Beac...more

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Quotes from The Farming of Bones

“Misery won't touch you gentle. It always leaves its thumbprints on you; sometimes it leaves them for others to see, sometimes for nobody but you to know of.” — 17 people liked it

“Old age is not meant to be survived alone," Man Rapadou said, her voice trailing with her own hidden thoughts. "Death should come gently, slowly, like a man's hand approaching your body. There can be joy in impatience if there is time to find the joy.” — 4 people liked it

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