Into a white millionaire's Caribbean mansion comes: Jadine, a graduate of the Sorbonne, art historian - an American black now living in Paris and Rome and Son, a criminal on the run, uneducated, violent, contemptuous - an American black from small-town Florida. He is a threat to her freedom she is a threat to his identity-
It is the mid-1800s. At Sweet Home in Kentuckhy, an era is ending as slavery comes under attack from the abolitionists. The worlds of Halleand Paul D. are to be destroyed in a cataclysm of torment and agony. The world of Sethe, however, is to turn from one of love to one of violence and death - the death of Sethe's baby daughter Beloved, whosename is the single word on the tombstone, who died at her mother's hands, and who will return to claim retribution.