I'm sketching out the plot for my next YA novel and one of the plot strands relates to a character based in the British colonies in what is now the United States (I'm thinking Virginia or the Carolinas) between 1660 and 1670.
For obvious reasons, we tend to skim over the whole colony thing in British history lessons, so there's not an obvious list of books that I can draw from, so if anyone can recommend texts or other sources on the following then I would be v. grateful:
- daily colonial life - I'm particularly interested in anything that looks at women's life in the Colonies during this period (work, expectations etc) but anything about the colonial societies generally will be invaluable. If there's anything on Colonies that just disappeared for no obvious reason, then that would be great as well;
- slavery. Not a pleasant topic and not one that we Brits are given to introspection over, but while I've found texts that mention the slave trade as operating to the Carribean and a couple have referenced Virginia most seem to suggest that plantations were predominantly worked by convicts who had had their sentences commuted from the death penalty (which I don't think can be correct); and
- sea voyages - there is source material I can go to on this in London, but I figure that someone somewhere must have written a decent book about what sea journeys were like back then but am having no joy with my Google-fu.
Many thanks in advance.
MM
For obvious reasons, we tend to skim over the whole colony thing in British history lessons, so there's not an obvious list of books that I can draw from, so if anyone can recommend texts or other sources on the following then I would be v. grateful:
- daily colonial life - I'm particularly interested in anything that looks at women's life in the Colonies during this period (work, expectations etc) but anything about the colonial societies generally will be invaluable. If there's anything on Colonies that just disappeared for no obvious reason, then that would be great as well;
- slavery. Not a pleasant topic and not one that we Brits are given to introspection over, but while I've found texts that mention the slave trade as operating to the Carribean and a couple have referenced Virginia most seem to suggest that plantations were predominantly worked by convicts who had had their sentences commuted from the death penalty (which I don't think can be correct); and
- sea voyages - there is source material I can go to on this in London, but I figure that someone somewhere must have written a decent book about what sea journeys were like back then but am having no joy with my Google-fu.
Many thanks in advance.
MM
