Just finished reading THE KITCHEN HOUSE by Kathleen Grissom, 2010.

A truly absorbing and interesting story set in southside Virginia during the period 1791-1810. Lavinia, a 7 year old Irish girl, has survived the Atlantic crossing but  her parents died and she has been separated from her surviving brother. The owner of Tall Oaks, Captain James Pyke, brings her to work there as an indentured servant. Lavinia is placed in the kitchen house under the care of Belle, who is the master's illegitimate daughter and light enough to pass for white. Lavinia bonds with the family in the kitchen house: Mama Mae, Papa George, Dory, Fanny, Beattie, and Ben, and she becomes intertwined with their lives; she is less concerned with the white family in the big house. The captain is often absent for months at a time, the mistress is usually in an opium fog, and their son Marshall is less than kind. Over time, however, she is taken in by the Pykes; Lavinia comes to care for Captain James, helps Miss Martha, and comes to an understanding with Marshall. Belle, for her part, is offered freedom by her father, but refuses it; the kitchen house is her home, the plantation's people are her family. Even later, when she is cruelly abused by the Pykes' overseer Rankin (a truly nasty character) and by Marshall, she's determined to stay. But when Lavinia, who ends up straddling both worlds and is forced to choose between them and unknowingly entangles Belle, events are set in motion that ultimately lead to tragedy for all the people at Tall Oaks. This is a story of race and boundaries; violence and cruelty and madness; goodness and love; loyalty and forgiveness; lust and betrayal. Grissom writes well, emotionally involving the reader with the characters, making you feel their pain and anguish and triumph, giving a storyline that moves along and creates suspense. Her use of two unusual narrators, Lavinia and Belle, and her main themes of history repeating itself and isolation are interesting and effectively presented. It also begs the question of just who is enslaved and who is free? Not your typical Southern plantation life novel.