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When we were birds : a novel / Ayanna Lloyd Banwo.

By: Material type: TextTextPublisher: New York : Doubleday, 2022Copyright date: ©2022Edition: First editionDescription: 292 pages ; 22 cmContent type:
  • text
Media type:
  • unmediated
Carrier type:
  • volume
ISBN:
  • 9780385547260
  • 0385547269
  • 9780593313619
  • 0593313615
Subject(s): Genre/Form: Summary: "The introduction of a singularly stunning new voice in fiction, Ayanna Gillian Lloyd's The Gatekeepers is a mythic love story set in contemporary Trinidad & Tobago about two young outsiders brought together by their connection with the dead"-- Provided by publisher.Summary: The St. Bernard women have lived in Morne Marie, the house on top of a hill outside Port Angeles, for generations. One woman in each generation is responsible for the passage of the city's souls into the afterlife. But when Petronella dies, Yejide is unprepared to fulfill her destiny. Darwin has always abided by the religious commandment not to interact with death, but when his mother can no longer work, the only job he can find is grave digging. Yejide and Darwin meet inside the gates of Fidelis, Port Angeles's largest and oldest cemetery, where the dead lie uneasy in their graves. -- adapted from jacket
List(s) this item appears in: Black voices
Holdings
Item type Home library Collection Call number Materials specified Status Date due Barcode Item holds
Adult Book Adult Book Dr. James Carlson Library Fiction BANWO, AYANNA Available 33111010603187
Adult Book Adult Book Main Library Fiction BANWO, AYANNA Available 33111010809727
Adult Book Adult Book Northport Library Fiction BANWO, AYANNA Available 33111009864451
Total holds: 0

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

A mythic love story set in Trinidad, Ayanna Lloyd Banwo's radiant debut is a masterwork of lush imagination and exuberant storytelling--a spellbinding and hopeful novel about inheritance, loss, and love's seismic power to heal.

"Roots the reader in [Trinidad's] traditions and rituals [and] ... in the glorious matriarchy by which lineage is upheld. The result is a depiction of ordinary life that's full and breathtaking."-- The New York Times Book Review

In the old house on a hill, where the city meets the rainforest, Yejide's mother is dying. She is leaving behind a legacy that now passes to Yejide: one St Bernard woman in every generation has the power to shepherd the city's souls into the afterlife. But after years of suffering her mother's neglect and bitterness, Yejide is looking for a way out.

Raised in the countryside by a devout Rastafarian mother, Darwin has always abided by the religious commandment not to interact with death. He has never been to a funeral, much less seen a dead body. But when the only job he can find is grave digging, he must betray the life his mother built for him in order to provide for them both. Newly shorn of his dreadlocks and his past, and determined to prove himself, Darwin finds himself adrift in a city electric with possibility and danger.

Yejide and Darwin will meet inside the gates of Fidelis, an ancient and sprawling cemetery, where the dead lie uneasy in their graves and a reckoning with fate beckons them both.

"The introduction of a singularly stunning new voice in fiction, Ayanna Gillian Lloyd's The Gatekeepers is a mythic love story set in contemporary Trinidad & Tobago about two young outsiders brought together by their connection with the dead"-- Provided by publisher.

The St. Bernard women have lived in Morne Marie, the house on top of a hill outside Port Angeles, for generations. One woman in each generation is responsible for the passage of the city's souls into the afterlife. But when Petronella dies, Yejide is unprepared to fulfill her destiny. Darwin has always abided by the religious commandment not to interact with death, but when his mother can no longer work, the only job he can find is grave digging. Yejide and Darwin meet inside the gates of Fidelis, Port Angeles's largest and oldest cemetery, where the dead lie uneasy in their graves. -- adapted from jacket

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