The Caribbean

Trinidad. An unconventional and modern household, protecting each other from the dangers of the world outside, happy in their differences until the day deeper differences explode and lead to an ugly rift. A book full of warmth and compassion that deals with difficult subject sensitively and reminds us that what bonds us together is love.

London and Antigua. Flamboyant and colourful, 74 year old Barrington arrived in Hackney in the 60s. A husband, father and  grandfather, proud of his Caribbean heritage, he likes to dress well, quote Shakespeare and is a well-known figure in his community. His disappointed and deeply religious wife thinks he is having affairs with other women. Little does she know that his heart lies with his childhood friend Morris. Having lived with that deception and the fear of being found out all his life will he ever find the courage to break away?

Set on a fictional Caribbean island over 24 hours and a sensory feast of a story. Magic realism, love, grief, sexuality, power and corruption. Fantastic descriptions, comedic moments, inventive and in places a little bit strange with quite the cast of characters. Very evocative capturing of the island, its flora and its food.

Barbados/British Guiana/Trinidad. Historical fiction. Rachel is searching for her children. For Mary Grace, Micah, Thomas Augustus, Cherry Jane and Mercy. These are the five who were sold to other plantations; the faces she cannot forget. It is 1834, and the law says her people are now free. But for Rachel freedom means finding her children.  With fear snapping at her heels, Rachel keeps moving. From sunrise to sunset, through the cane fields of Barbados to the forests of British Guiana, then on to Trinidad, up the dangerous river and to the open sea. Only once she knows their stories can she rest. Only then can she finally find home...

Barbados. An unknowable legacy passes through generations of one family living on the beautiful island of Barbados. There is Iapetus, a lonely soul haunted by the memory of his father; his son Atlas, dreaming of a life far removed from his reality; Atlas’s daughter Calypso, struggling to find her place in an unforgiving society; and her son Nautilus, grappling with various parts of a complex identity. Each longs to escape their circumstances but find themselves trapped by a history found only in whispers and half-remembered fragments. And with every passing decade, another generation must contend with the same question: how can the things we don’t know define our futures?

Crime fiction. Secrets can be buried, but bones can speak . . . After standing witness to a murder on the streets of the Caribbean island of Camaho, young Michael 'Digger' Digson is recruited into a unique plain clothes homicide squad, an eclectic group of semi-official police officers, led by the enigmatic DS Chilman. Digger becomes enmeshed in Chilman's obsession with a cold case, the disappearance of a young man. But Digger has a murder to pursue too: that of his mother, killed by a renegade police squad when he was a boy. He has two weapons at his disposal - his skill in forensics, and Chilman's latest recruit, the mysterious, observant Miss Stanislaus. Together, the two find themselves dragged into a world of dangerous secrets that demands every ounce of their courage to survive. Winner of the Jhalak Prize.

Longlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction. ‘Don’t go Mammy please.’ Stuttered words filled her ears, sent frissons of guilt through her as she bent over him; held him to her thumping chest. Tears sliding from her face to his. Raef is left behind in Grenada when his mother, Cilla, follows her husband to England in search of a better life. When they are finally reunited seven years later, they are strangers – and the emotional impact of the separation leads to events that rip their family apart. As they try to move forward with their lives, his mother’s secret will make Raef question all he’s ever known of who he is. An unflinching and harrowing account of one family's experience of immigration, exploring identity, mental health crises and family. Mostly set in London.