Solomon Northup was a free man, a husband, a father and a violinist in New York when two strangers offered him work, drugged him, and sold him south. For twelve years he survived Louisiana plantations under owners kind and monstrous, hiding his identity to stay alive, until a chance meeting carried a letter home.
His account, published in 1853, is precise, restrained and devastating, and it became the basis of the Academy Award winning film. The book goes deeper than any adaptation could.
