The Slave Dancer by Paula Fox might be the most graphic of the Newbery winners that I've read. I thought it was a good book - though I wouldn't really call it an enjoyable book. Several parts of the book disgusted me or made me uncomfortable (arguably the point). Because it delves into the 19th century slave trade this book is going to require some historical background on the reader's part. This may appear to be a slim book, but for subject matter alone I'd push it towards the higher end of the Newbery's age range. There is strong language (yes - the word you are probably thinking of), violence, gruesome death, and general immorality to be found throughout the book.
The main character is Jesse, a fife player from New Orleans, who is kidnapped and brought aboard the slave ship The Moonlight in order to play tunes for captured Africans to dance to as they are brought to the Caribbean and United States to be sold. Jesse himself is against the slave trade though the book never seems to give him stronger reasons than he is a good person (this doesn't hurt the story much because it was written for children). You can definitely pick up on the trauma the African people went through on the ship but again, due to the target audience, not a lot of depth is gone into.
Overall a good read. This book perhaps highlights the problems of reading these books as an adult. I kept wanting the author to delve deeper - but on the other hand I thought this was already pushing it about as far as it could go and still be appropriate for children.
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