“This riveting story offers a close look at the inner dynamics of a slave war-its fraught alliances and antagonisms, strategies and tactics, and the grievances and aspirations of its combatants and resistors.” -Vincent Brown, author of Tacky’s Revolt: The Story of an Atlantic Slave War Blood on the River is a story for the ages.” -Elizabeth Fenn, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Encounters at the Heart of the World: A History of the Mandan People Instead, you’ll find human beings in full relief, acting with courage, kindness, calculation, and mendacity in their quest for self-determination. Marjoleine Kars has unearthed a little-known rebellion in the Dutch colony of Berbice and rendered its story with insight, empathy, and wisdom. “A riveting addition to the history of the search for freedom in the Americas.” - Kirkus Reviews Michael Ignatieff, chair of the Cundill Prize jury, declared that Blood on the River “tells a story so dramatic, so compelling that no reader will be able to put the book down.”ĭrawing on nine hundred interrogation transcripts collected by the Dutch when the rebellion collapsed, and which were subsequently buried in Dutch archives, historian Marjoleine Kars has constructed what Pulitzer Prize–winning historian Eric Foner calls “a gripping narrative that brings to life a forgotten world.” Blood on the River is the explosive story of this little-known revolution, one that almost changed the face of the Americas. Nearly two hundred sixty years ago, on Sunday, February 27, 1763, thousands of slaves in the Dutch colony of Berbice-in present-day Guyana-launched a rebellion that came amazingly close to succeeding. A book with profound relevance for our own time, Blood on the River “fundamentally alters what we know about revolutionary change” according to Cundill Prize juror and NYU history professor Jennifer Morgan. Named one of the best books of the year by NPR, Blood on the River also won two of the highest honors for works of history, capturing both the Frederick Douglass Prize and the Cundill History Prize in 2021.

Tacky's revolt book