Set Me Free by Ann Clare LeZotte

Set Me Free follows the further adventures of Mary Lambert, a deaf girl growing up in Martha’s Vineyard at the turn of the 19th century.

Set Me Free by Ann Clare LeZotte. Scholastic, 2021, 253 pages.

Reading Level: Middle Grades, ages 10-12

Recommended for: ages 12-15

It’s been two years since Mary Lambert was kidnapped from her home on Martha’s Vineyard in order to serve as an object for “scientific study.” As a profoundly deaf member of a community containing an unusual number of the deaf, she was seen as a useful experiment. Her capture and rescue formed the plot of Show Me a Sign. Now 14, Mary has largely recovered from the trauma, enough to feel restless in her calm life on the Vineyard. A letter from a former acquaintance rouses her interest, even if it also includes a sense of foreboding.

Nora is working as a housemaid at the Vale, an estate outside Boston. She writes that her mistress’s niece, a girl of about eight, is considered untamable and is kept locked up in an attic, but Nora suspects the girl is deaf and mute. She wonders if Mary could help her. After only brief consideration, Mary decides to take the offer, even though her parents distrust it. Her teacher Mrs. Pye and her pastor Rev. Lee both consider it an act of mercy if she could help the little girl. But as Nora hints, and Mary soon learns, there’s a dark side to the situation.

The author is herself deaf and writes in a slightly formalized style that fits the first-person historical narrative (though I noticed some scattered language anachronisms). Mary is an interesting character with some prickly as well as vulnerable tendencies. At times she seems too judgmental of her neighbors, especially in their treatment of the native population. Where the Wampanoag are concerned, she sounds more like a 21^st century anti-colonialist than a girl of 1805. But her Christian faith is real and deep, and the Christian characters in the novel, particularly Rev. Lee, live their faith as much as they speak it. Mary approaches her tutoring mission with a Christian purpose: “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” By the end it’s clear that more adventures lie ahead, and Martha’s Vineyard is a place Mary must move beyond.

Overall rating: 4.25 (out of 5)

• Worldview/moral value: 4.5
• Artistic/literary value: 4

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Also at Redeemed Reader:

• Reviews: Other books exploring deafness: El Deafo, Song for a Whale, and *All He Knew.
• Review: For a nonfiction view of another type of disability, see Her Own Two Feet.

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