The story takes place in the mid 1800’s at a time when race riots and attacks on abolitionists were commonplace. Charlotte is a runaway slave living with her father who passes for white. Nell is part of the elite black society and Evie is a slave wanting freedom. It was so interesting to see the divisions within these women. Even in a state supposedly free, there were still slaves. The fear of these black women really got to me.
I voluntarily read and reviewed an advance copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

The 1837 time period and Philadelphia setting is history that is seldom taught.
The three Black women in the story allow the reader to see very different stories and lives lived during this period .

Charlotte who escaped slavery in the south, is in another type of nightmare with her white passing father. Nell on the other hand is from a well to do Black family. The two join forces to rescue Evie who has ties to Charlotte’s past and is being kept as a nursemaid.

There is suspense throughout as identities, safety and lives are at risk. Lattimore even adds a fake engagement which I loved.

The story will keep you turning the pages while understanding the significance of Philadelphia in the abolitionist movement. History such as the Philadelphia Female Ant-Slavery Society and the burning of Pennsylvania Hall is too important to be swept under a rug.

Heartbreaking with relatable endearing characters. ALL WE WERE PROMISED has a truly, UNIQUE storyline exploring pre-Civil War Black society in 1837 Philadelphia; -the city that represents the Birthplace of Freedom. This story entails the lives of three Black women; -Charlotte, Nell and Evie, each from varying backgrounds. Charlotte and Nell plan to help youngest girl Evie escape from her white owner. On her own, Evie flees, with Charlotte and Nell only to be kidnapped due to a mixup by hired slave-catchers. You see, there’s a kinship between Evie and Charlotte. Both were slaves on the same southern plantation.. plus another startling secret.. Charlotte’s fathers’ life is at risk if his “secret” is ever discovered. I love how the author wrote with specific detail providing a very thorough look into each of these women’s lives. I never really knew until reading this about the danger in Philadelphia that free Blacks faced. Racial division. Hordes of angry whites protesting abolition including the beatings or deaths of Black citizens. And the real burning of Pennsylvania Hall. Did you know that Black women were key factors in the abolitionist cause and the building of Pennsylvania Hall. What a fascinating debut! I highly recommend it. Ashton Lattimore has also included an authors note detailing the books inspiration and her research. 5 stars — Pub. 4/2/24

I received a copy from the publisher through NetGalley. All opinions are my own.

All We Were Promised by Ashton Lattimore is a beautifully written story about life in pre-civil war Philadelphia. Told from the point of view of three women, it explores the differences in the stations of Black people during that time. Nell comes from a prominent family, while Evie is a slave and Charlotte is a runaway slave who’s still living as a maid. When the three women work together to free Evie, they may find more trouble than they bargain for. Very well written and touching, I highly recommend.

What a great debut from Ashton Lattimore, a new voice in historical fiction and one I hope to read more from. All We Were Promised takes place in 1837 in Philadelphia - city of brotherly love and also where ‘free’ blacks can live ‘in peace’. History sometimes forgets that the North wasn’t the Mecca it is often portrayed as in movies and books. Slavery may not have been legal but there was plenty of racism, discrimination and violence to go around. The story focuses on three women with different backgrounds - Charlotte, Nell and Evie and what the abolitionist movement means to each of them. Hard to read at times but also hard to put down. Well done.
“Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with this ebook in exchange for an honest review”

Captivating historical fiction based around the lives of three Black women in 1837 Philadelphia. Pre-Civil war Philadelphia is supposedly a slavery - free state. Far from the truth that is. Charlotte and her father James are runaways from Maryland who have settled there for almost four years. James is passing as white and trying to build a successful woodworking business. Charlotte, posing as his black maid, comes across Nell and gets increasingly involved in the fledgling Abolitionist movement. Nell is a Black woman from a prominent Philadelphia Black family who have lived there for generations. Evie, a black slave woman and a childhood friend of Charlotte's is visiting Philadelphia along with her mistress and wants to run away with Charlotte's help. I loved the way the author has deftly woven fiction with historical events and brought history alive in vivid detail. I loved all the characters and the storyline. The author claims to draw inspiration from Les Miserables for the same. It was a revelation that Philadelphia had a substantial Black free population some of whom were very well off and running established businesses. This is a must-read for anybody interested in a very well-researched and entertaining account of the pre-civil war history of the Abolitionist movement and the plight of the people of colour. I really loved it.

Thank you Netgalley, Random House Publishing Ballantine and Ashton Lattimore for the ARC.

I read this historical fiction novel during Black History Month and during a trip to Philadelphia. It was an enlightening novel about free Blacks living in Philadelphia but still dealing with racism. Seeing some of the places mentioned in the novel while I was in the city really brought the story to life. Even in the North, African Americans were not treated equally.

Ashton Lattimore's novel All We Were Promised, which she wrote during National Novel Writing Month, follows three characters. Nell was born free to a well-off Black Philadelphian family. She's part of women's anti-slavery groups but feels they could be doing more to help enslaved people. Charlotte works as a housemaid for a white man. Except, he's not a white man. He's her father who is passing as white. The two of them ran away from their masters in Maryland and settled in Philadelphia. And Evie is a slave from Charlotte's former plantation. Evie arrives in Philadelphia to accompany her mistress as she searches for a new husband. But Evie doesn't want to return to Maryland or Virginia, where her mistress is going to relocate with her new beau. So after a chance encounter with Charlotte, Evie plans to run away.

Can you imagine living in a city where you're free but treated with contempt from your fellow citizens? Where your place of refuge is burned to the ground? Where you could be kidnapped off the street at any moment and be sent South to become a slave? These questions and more make this novel a great book club read.

All We Were Promised is published by Ballantine Books and will be available to purchase April 2, 2024 (tomorrow!). I received a free e-ARC from the publisher.

Thank you to NetGalley and Ballentine Books for the ARC.

The story is good, but, oh my, it drags, and drags, and drags ... if something could be told in five words, the author used fifty and then repeated it in every other chapter ... stilted wooden characters ... didn't like them, didn't hate them -- they were just words on the paper.

I give it a 3 stars because, I'm sure, the author spent a lot of time researching her subject matter but her editor should have helped in speeding up the story and cutting back on the repetition.

Ashton Lattimore is a new author for me. I chose to read this book because the description sounded like it dealt with the abolitionist movement and the fight for freedom.

Description:
Philadelphia, 1837. After Charlotte escaped from the crumbling White Oaks plantation down South, she’d expected freedom to feel different from her former life as an enslaved housemaid. After all, Philadelphia is supposed to be the birthplace of American liberty. Instead, she’s locked away playing servant to her white-passing father, as they both attempt to hide their identities from slavecatchers who would destroy their new lives.

Longing to break away, Charlotte befriends Nell, a budding abolitionist from one of Philadelphia’s wealthiest Black families. Just as Charlotte starts to envision a future, a familiar face from her past reappears: Evie, her friend from White Oaks, has been brought to the city by the plantation mistress, and she’s desperate to escape. But as Charlotte and Nell conspire to rescue her, in a city engulfed by race riots and attacks on abolitionists, they soon discover that fighting for Evie’s freedom may cost them their own.

My Thoughts:
This book was enlightening for me as it is the first I've read during the pre-Civil War time period that was not set in what is considered the "deep south". The setting here is Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and many Blacks are free. Just a bit further south the environment at the time would be totally different. There are still major prejudices and segregation here though. I found the political standing of the abolitionists at this time to be brave considering the atmosphere in the city. Obviously, they were inviting trouble. The story of Charlotte and her father, as well as Evie was heartbreaking. It was easy to hate Kate for her role here. Sometimes I found the book a bit slow, but I felt it a good portrayal of what was happening during this time period.

Thanks to Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine through Netgalley for an advance copy.

All We Were Promised storylines (there are three) are centered around three individuals: Carrie/Charlotte (the escaped slave), Nell (an upper-class free woman of color), and Evie (a slave and Charlotte’s friend). The storyline was well-written and compelling. I was immersed in all three women’s plights and was an anxious mess during the last half of the book. I will warn you all that this book does not hold back when it comes to the treatment of black people (both slaves and free) pre-Civil War.

The storyline that centered on Carrie/Charlotte was sad. Charlotte and her father, James, escaped from slavery four years before the book started. James, or Jack as he was known to his former owners and Evie, could pass as a white man. He took advantage of that and built a thriving woodworking business. But, for Charlotte, it was torture. She was kept on a short leash and couldn’t interact with anyone but her father and the cook (who was a free man of color). It drove her up the wall and was why she started going to Nell’s reading club and sharing her abolitionist views. Charlotte was sympathetic, but I felt she took some unneeded risks. Like not telling Nell the whole truth about herself and how she knew Evie. Or risking her freedom to attend speeches by famous abolitionists. She also blamed her father for everything that went wrong, which also factored into her behavior.

The storyline that centered on Nell was interesting. She was a free woman of color who was also upper-class and whose family held considerable power in Philadelphia. Nell did come across as a pampered, spoiled woman sometimes, but you could tell her heart was in the right place. Meeting Charlotte and getting involved with her quest to free Evie opened her eyes. I did have some unanswered questions about her (mainly about the engagement and whether she learned anything from what happened to her).

The storyline that centered on Evie caught my heart and my attention. Evie was the personal slave of Missus Kate, and what she endured was awful. His mother and brother were both sold, leaving her alone on the plantation with Kate and a handful of slaves. I couldn’t get past the cruelty that was so casual or Kate’s lack of empathy. My draw dropped when Kate told Evie her plans for her after Kate’s marriage and where she was going (the brother’s manor for reeducation). I was caught up in this storyline and was rooting for Evie to leave.

This book takes place thirty years before the start of the Civil War. Every event mentioned in the book is accurate, and the author explains everything in a beautifully worded afterword.

Philadelphia did not live up to its City of Brotherly Love motto during this time. There was racial tension and rioting that seemed to be almost every day. It was a stressful time to live in.

The end of All We Were Promised was a little bittersweet. The author did not cement the futures of the three girls. I want to think that Evie and Charlotte could live freely and happily. I’d also like to believe that Nell kept to her values and what she wanted to do (be active in the abolitionist movement and not marry).

Many thanks to Random House Publishing Group – Ballantine, Ballantine Books, NetGalley, and Ashton Lattimore for allowing me to read and review this ARC of All We Were Promised. All opinions stated in this review are mine.

It’s 1837 in Philadelphia and 3 black women’s lives are about to collide in a powerful story about what it means to be a free black person in the pre civil war era.

Charlotte and her father are former slaves who escaped the south and are starting over. Charlotte’s father is white passing and she is pretending to be his housemaid, but this act comes at a high expense for Charlotte who resents the freedoms her father has and the constraints that are put on her. And the. She meets Nell, a young black girl from a wealthy Black family and together they join the abolitionist movement. All seems to go well until Evie shows up in town and begs Charlotte for help. Evie was left alone on the plantation after Charlotte and her father escaped and now Evie is trapped with her missus and needs her help. Charlotte enlists Nell in helping her, and the 2 young women, along with some friends, risk everything in an attempt to help Evie before her time runs out.

This novel had a slow build up. Once Evie was introduced, the pace picked up and I was desperate to know how it would all pan out. I was fascinated by the premise of this novel and enjoyed the supporting characters as well. The characters are well developed and we can see why they do what they do as their back stories are slowly revealed. I also think there is a lot about that time period that is relatable to today. Many oppressed groups are still afraid to make waves as it can be dangerous to their own survival and are taught to just follow the rules.

The set up is Philadelphia in the 1830's. Charlotte is a run away slave working as a housemaid for James who is actually her father passing as white. His business as a furniture maker is growing and he tries to keep his daughter at home afraid his secret will be revealed. A good portion of the story centers on Charlotte, with the help of Nell, trying to free Evie, a young girl Charlotte was close to when she was a slave.

I found the first third of the book to be pretty slow. Meetings could only take place at a certain time every week and it could be months as plans were formed. While all the characters were interesting I didn't feel they were ever developed enough for me to form an opinion or care about an outcome. This was the 1830's and at times the dialog felt a bit off, too modern maybe. I did learn a good bit about the history of Philadelphia and it's part in slavery. I did enjoy it but felt like I wanted just a bit more of something.

Thank you to Netgalley and Random House Ballantine for providing me with a digital copy.

This was a really fascinating look at pre-war Philadelphia. I think so many novels take place during those war years, it’s nice to have a change of setting and just a different backdrop to the events and the feelings of the story. It’s odd to say a book about life as a black woman during this time is enjoyable; maybe it’s better to say this is a well-written and compelling story. I do really enjoy reading about the lives of free black folks and the limitations they lived within. It’s a nice change of pace from many other books set during this time.

Set in Philadelphia in the 1830's this book tells the stories of three Black women. Charlotte escaped enslavement in Virginia with her father but now feels like she is no more than a servant to him in his effort to pass as white and build a business for himself. Nell comes from a wealthy Black family and is active in the abolitionist movement. Evie, still enslaved, has been brought to Philadelphia. Their lives intertwine in a novel that highlights the anti-slavery movement in Philadelphia. Although written for adults, the book is extremely accessible for teen readers as well.

All the feels for the women of All We Were Promised by Ashton Lattimore. This was definitely a learning experience of a time in history I have never heard of. We've all heard of the Civil War but not the earlier years of slavery and freedom in Philadelphia. As a great book should this made me look into the history before the Civil War. Thank you for opening my eyes to even more strong women of history trying to do right by all.

I rooted so hard for Charlotte, Evie, and Nell in All We Were Promised. I loved the different perspectives of what life was like for each of them as black women with different statuses in that time period. I learned a lot that I had never heard before from this book. Darcel was my favorite side character. I loved his warmth and care for Charlotte. The author's note at the end also has a wealth of information and I loved finding out that some characters were real people.

The book takes place in 1830 and follows slaves from the same plantation in South Carolina. It begins with a slave James that was able to pass for white and his daughter Carrie. They successfully make it to Pennsylvania where the father is able to build a successful business as a furniture maker, His daughter, who takes on the name Charlotte, has darker skin and lives in their home as his housekeeper. Charlotte is constantly thinking of the friends and family they left behind when they escaped. She becomes involved with another free black woman Nell who is involved with the abolitionist movement. One day Charlotte sees the slave that she grew up with and left behind - Evie. She then begins to plan Evie's escape before Evie's owner travels back to South Carolina. The characters are so well written that you really care what happens to them. I found the epilogue very informative and encourage all to read it. Example - If a slave stayed in Pennsylvania more than 6 months they were free, however there owners sent them out of the state before the 6 months to circumnavigate this law. I look forward to reading other books by this author.

A new perspective of life pre-Civil War in Philadelphia as told by three black women, each living in different social classes within the city. This novel was bit drawn out, repetitive and subplots. This had the makings for a truly impactful story for fans of HistFic but overall the writing didn't hold my interest.

Thank you, Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine | Ballantine Books

I enjoy historical fiction because it provides an understanding of our past. The book focuses on events and treatment of Blacks that I wish never happened, but despite this, it is still important to understand where we have come from. This is a well-written, insightful story. I also appreciated the strength, fearlessness and commitment of the Black individuals depicted in the story.

At the center of the story is Charlotte, a runaway slave living in Philadelphia in 1837 and working as a housemaid for her father who is passing. Her father is operating a successful furniture business and enjoying the benefits of being a white. Charlotte is struggling to understand why they ran and left behind some of their fellow slaves, who were more like family. Plus, because of needing to hide who they really are, Charlotte isn't experiencing any of the benefits of a better life.

Despite this, Charlotte befriends a free Black woman from an elite family who is involved in abolitionist, anti-slavery activities. Because of Charlotte's personal experiences, which she can't share with anyone, she is willing to do what she can to support these efforts. However, things start to become more real when individuals from Charlotte's past show up in Philadelphia. Charlotte starts plotting and planning with Nell and her friends to help Evie, a slave from Charlotte's past, run from her owners. The last portion of the book includes some truly horrific details of slavery and the treatment of Black people.

Despite the fact that the time period of this story is based on events from almost 200 years ago, it is even more frightening to see that although the world has changed, we still see very similar behaviors today.

I received a complimentary copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions expressed in this review are my own.

#AllWeWerePromised #AshtonLattimore #BallantineBooks

This is a story of escaped slaves, well-off free Blacks, and an enslaved young woman wanted to flea to safety before going back to the South with her owners.

This is a story about Philadelphia in the 1830's, a bee hive of activity for people who supported slavery and abolitionists, and everyone in between. Philadelphia, a free state, on the borders of slave states is not an easy place to be a free Black, even if your family has been free for generations.

It's a well written story told about three young women, all approximately the same age who are doing the best they can in difficult situations, at a very tumultuous time in our history. I'd recommend this book for lovers of history and I think it would be a great assignment for students, especially during Black History Month.