Fall for the Book 2019

Curdella Forbes and Katia D. Ulysse discuss their novels, which deal with themes of love and loss in Caribbean countries, as well as how to come to terms with personal choices brought on by societal and cultural standards. Forbes’ A Tall History of Sugar follows a Jamaican love affair spanning 50 years, that Publisher’s Weekly calls “an unlikely love story as well as a haunting, hypnotic piece of postcolonial Jamaican history.” Ulysse’s Mouths Don’t Speak revolves around a Haitian immigrant’s guilt-ridden and sorrowful return to her home country after the 2010 Haitian earthquake. Publisher’s Weekly calls it “a harrowing, thoughtful dive into the aftermath of national and personal tragedies filtered through diasporic life.”