Maria of the Recôncavo in the Clinic

Maria of the Recôncavo in the Clinic: The Promise, the Fire, and Freedom* is a powerful clinical-literary work of historical fiction about an enslaved woman in nineteenth-century Brazil.

When a promise of freedom is deliberately transformed into a tool of exploitation, Maria is driven toward an act of resistance that changes her life—but cannot silence the memories left behind.

Years later, in the clinic, she revisits the trauma of captivity, the death of Joaquim, the burden of guilt, and the difficult boundary between justice and revenge. Sensitive, symbolic, and emotionally intense, this story explores slavery, dignity, grief, responsibility, memory, and the possibility of rebuilding one’s identity after violence.