I will never know what it was like to live and fight during the Civil War years in the South. And I will certainly never know the experience of being a slave. However, the novel Black Cloud Rising gave me some sense, admittedly in the smallest of ways, of those times, those lives, the struggles which ring all too familiar today, some 160 years later.

Wright Faladé’s creative decision to have Richard tell his story in the language and cadence of the times transported me to that moment in history where freed and runaway slaves joined Union forces to fight for their freedom and rightful place in America. It was the power of that captivating voice from an earlier century that helped me believe I understood some of Etheridge’s life. I came to recognize something familiar in Richard’s questions about identity, loyalty, mortality, and love. Black Cloud Rising got me – a privileged, educated White woman in the latter half of her life – to come closer than I would have thought possible to imagining the life of a 20-year-old mixed race slave from 1800s North Carolina serving in the Union Army. For who among us has not struggled with existential anxiety, and a helpless feeling at the disharmony in our world? Who among has felt called to action yet hesitated with fear for the impact on our lives, or doubt the effectiveness of our actions? I know I benefitted from slipping out of our current crises into those of another time and seeing how a man with the odds stacked against him at every turn, made his way. Richard Etheridge emerged from the Civil War as a leader who maintained relations with all types of people, including those who saw him as “less than.” Etheridge’s story gave me hope.

This book taught me to look deeper into history to the stories that haven’t been told, and those that have gone unacknowledged. After reading this novel, I see connections among all of us that I hadn’t noticed or embraced. After all, aren’t we all seeking our place in the world, and the part that we can play in it?

NOTE: David Wright Faladé is a friend of over thirty years. It has been one of my greatest privileges as well as highly educational to be a reader of David’s writing for a good portion of those years. David shared early pages of what is now Black Cloud Rising in 2015 and what an honor it has been to be in conversation about this story. For me, those early pages established the importance of this remarkable read.

Others seem to agree. If their views may convince you to add this book to your reading list, I recommend these few of many:

This remains my favorite of the conversations about this book. https://www.npr.org/2022/02/19/1081948842/black-cloud-rising-is-the-story-of-an-all-black-brigade-in-the-u-s-civil-war

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/14/books/review-black-cloud-rising-david-wright-falade.html

https://www.libraryjournal.com/review/black-cloud-rising-2133027

I learned about this blog from David. I also learned that music seems to play a very small role in his life. We shouldn’t be friends! Nevertheless, we are and I appreciate knowing about this blog: http://www.largeheartedboy.com/blog/archive/2022/03/david_wright_fa.html

If you prefer listening to books, I can strongly recommend the Audible recording of Black Cloud Rising. Actor James Shippy delivers the story with distinctive voices for each character and I heard parts of the story in new ways by listening to this version.

And, yes, this is the same David Wright, now Wright Faladé, to honor his biological father, whose book Away Running I wrote about in an earlier post. https://bethdyerclary.com/2019/02/01/why-ya/