How to Love a Jamaican: Stories

How to Love a Jamaican: Stories

â€œIn these kaleidoscopic stories of Jamaica and its diaspora we hear many voices at once. All of them convince and sing. All of them shine.â€â€”Zadie Smith

An O: The Oprah Magazine â€œTop 15 Best of the Yearâ€Â â€¢Â A Well-Read Black GirlÂ Pick

Tenderness and cruelty, loyalty and betrayal, ambition and regretâ€”Alexia Arthurs navigates these tensions to extraordinary effect in her debut collection about Jamaican immigrants and their families back home. Sweeping from close-knit island communities to the streets of New York City and midwestern university towns, these eleven stories form a portrait of a nation, a people, and a way of life.

In â€œLight-Skinned Girls and Kelly Rowlands,â€ an NYU student befriends a fellow Jamaican whose privileged West Coast upbringing has blinded her to the hard realities of race. In â€œMash Up Love,â€ a twinâ€™s chance sighting of his estranged brotherâ€”the prodigal son of the familyâ€”stirs up unresolved feelings of resentment. In â€œBad Behavior,â€ a couple leave their wild teenage daughter with her grandmother in Jamaica, hoping the old ways will straighten her out. In â€œMermaid River,â€ a Jamaican teenage boy is reunited with his mother in New York after eight years apart. In â€œThe Ghost of Jia Yi,â€ a recently murdered student haunts a despairing Jamaican athlete recruited to an Iowa college. And in â€œShirley from a Small Place,â€ a world-famous pop star retreats to her motherâ€™s big new house in Jamaica, which still holds the power to restore something vital.

Alexia Arthurs emerges in this vibrant, lyrical, intimate collection as one of fictionâ€™s most dynamic and essential authors.

Praise for How to Love a Jamaican

â€œA sublime short-story collection from newcomer Alexia Arthurs that explores, through various characters, a specific strand of the immigrant experience.â€â€”Entertainment Weekly

â€œWith its singular mix of psychological precision and sun-kissed lyricism, this dazzling debut marks the emergence of a knockout new voice.â€â€”O: The Oprah Magazine

â€œGorgeous, tender, heartbreaking stories . . . Arthurs is a witty, perceptive, and generous writer, and this is a book that will last.â€â€”Carmen Maria Machado, author of Her Body and Other Parties

â€œVivid and exciting . . . every story rings beautifully true.â€â€”Marie Claire

Country	USA
Author	Alexia Arthurs
Binding	Hardcover
EAN	9781524799205
ISBN	1524799203
Label	Ballantine Books
Manufacturer	Ballantine Books
NumberOfItems	1
NumberOfPages	256
PublicationDate	2018-07-24
Publisher	Ballantine Books
ReleaseDate	2018-07-24
Studio	Ballantine Books

How to Love a Jamaican: Stories

You might also like...