Will I love The Secret Diaries of Charles Ignatius Sancho?

Charles Ignatius Sancho, born in 1729 was the first Black man to vote in Britain. His famous painting as well as his writings have been readily available for some time now. However, what this book has done is weave these stories into a narrative that is part fact, part fiction. I like to do the same with my own novels as in ‘filling the blanks of someone’s life’. The life of a person who once lived and who once breathed.

I love that this novel includes scenes set in Georgian London. A Black man in such a historical setting is… show more.

I adored this book from the first page to the last and missed the ebullient, foppishly theatrical, heartbreaking, and inspiring Sancho when he was gone.

It’s an important story—the true tale of the first black Briton to have the vote—but it’s also a supremely well-told story, following Sancho, via letters and diaries, from his birth on a slave ship through the often dangerous streets of 18th-century England.

Sancho, his contemporaries, and their environment are vividly brought to life. I was particularly delighted by Joseph's language—virtually every line contains an arresting image or a poetic turn of phrase.