Flight of the Sparrow (2014) by Amy Belding Brown is a historical fiction novel about the life of Mary Rowlandson, an English Puritan colonist who was captured by the Wampanoag leader Metacomet’s forces in 1676 as part of King Philip’s War in New England. The novel is inspired by the historical memoir The Sovereignty and the Goodness of God: Being a Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson (1682). Brown is the author of two other works of historical fiction that take place in New England, Mr. Emerson’s Wife (2005) about the third wife of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Lidian Jackson, and Emily’s House (2021) about Emily Dickinson’s longtime maid, Margaret Maher.

Mary Rowlandson’s original memoir is believed to have been edited by Increase Mather (father of witch hunter Cotton Mather) and Rowlandson’s husband. Brown uses the historical fiction genre to explore what Mary’s personal experiences may have really been like without the mediation of these religious men. During her nearly three months in captivity, the fictional Mary Rowlandson struggles with her faith, her understanding of freedom, and her feelings for an attractive, intelligent, and kind Indigenous man named James Printer.

This guide refers to the 2014 New American Library paperback edition of Flight of the Sparrow.

Content Warning: The source material features graphic depictions of racism, violence, enslavement, sexual assault, child death, and suicide. Additionally, the source material uses offensive terms for Indigenous Americans throughout, which is replicated in this guide only in direct quotes of the source material.

Plot Summary

The Flight of the Sparrows opens in 1672 in Lancaster, Massachusetts. Wife of a Puritan minister Mary Rowlandson is summoned by her neighbor, Edmund Parker, to assist his daughter, Bess, in giving birth. None of the other women in the town will help Bess because they believe she has sinned by conceiving out of wedlock while in indentured servitude. Mary helps her and learns that the child’s father is a Black enslaved man named Silvanus. When the child is around two years old, the court rules he must be given to Silvanus’s enslaver. Mary’s husband, Joseph, assists the townsmen in taking the child away from Bess; Mary is devastated by these events.

A few years later, in 1676, a group of Indigenous Americans attacks Lancaster. Joseph is away in Boston asking for military protection at the time of the attack. Mary and her children, Sarah, Marie, and Joss, are captured, while other townspeople are either captured or killed. Mary is separated from Marie and Joss, and she is put into the service of a Wampanoag leader named Weetamoo living among the Nipmuc people. Soon after, her daughter, Sarah, dies of the injuries she sustained during the attack. Weetamoo is a difficult and capricious mistress, but over time Mary comes to respect and admire her for her leadership. Mary learns that Weetamoo is part of a coalition with the leader Metacomet, or Philip, who is fighting the English colonists.

While being held captive, Mary befriends a so-called “Praying Indian,” or an Indigenous person who has converted to Christianity, named James Printer. James speaks English as he spent time with the president of Harvard and later as an apprentice to a printer named Samuel Green. He was also captured by Metacomet’s forces after being held in an English prison camp on Deer Island in Boston Harbor. James helps Mary by giving her food and a Bible and teaching her words in Nipmuc. They become very close, and Mary develops feelings for him.

One day, Mary is taken to meet with Metacomet. She is asked to name a ransom price for herself. She says 20 pounds sterling and is sent away. That night, Mary begs James to help her find a way to stay with the Nipmuc. He says he cannot help her. Shortly thereafter, Mary’s husband pays her ransom, and she is released back to Puritan society.

Upon her return, Mary realizes how much time with the Nipmuc has changed her. She longs for the freedom she had in the wilderness with them, and she experiences a crisis of faith. Her husband and the minister, Increase Mather, encourage Mary to write an account of her time in captivity, which they hope to use to spread a Christian message. Mary agrees to do so on the condition that James Printer is offered amnesty at the end of the war. Increase agrees to her terms, and Mary writes her account. Soon after, Mary’s children, Marie and Joss, are released as well. All three of them struggle to readjust to Puritan society.

After the war ends, Indigenous Americans are offered amnesty by the British, but they are forced to live in miserable conditions. Mary and Joseph go to a town where many of them are being held. She is shocked at how hungry and miserable they are in contrast to how she was treated during her time with the Nipmuc. There, Mary meets with James who is angry with her for not arranging better terms for his amnesty.

Eventually, Joseph Rowlandson is given a post in Wethersfield, Connecticut. The family moves there and attempts to make a fresh start. One day, at lunch, Joseph drops dead of a heart attack. Soon after, Mary remarries the barrister Samuel Talcott. Samuel encourages Mary to write Increase about her manuscript. She learns that it is due to be published soon. Samuel and Mary travel to Boston where they go to Samuel Green’s print shop to see it being typeset. While there, Mary speaks to James Printer for the final time. He expresses remorse for the sacrifices they both have had to make to survive. Mary and Samuel return home to Wethersfield. Mary feels content with her new life, even as she holds on to memories of her time with the Nipmuc.