Abducted as an eleven-year-old child from her village in West Africa, Aminata is put to work on an indigo plantation on the sea islands of South Carolina. She survives by using midwifery skills learned from her mother, but remains trapped, narrowly avoiding the violence that cuts short so many lives around her. Eventually, she registers her name in the "Book of Negroes", a historic British military ledger allowing 3,000 Black Loyalists passage on ships bound for Nova Scotia.