BCLF Cocoa Pod

After a personal tragedy upends his world, American-born artist Chris travels to his mother's homeland in the Caribbean hoping to find some peace and tranquility. He plans to spend his time painting in solitude and coming to terms with his recent loss and his fractured relationship with his father. Instead, he discovers a new extended and complicated "family." The people he meets he...

River Sing Me Home by Eleanor Shearer  River Sing Me Home is a beautiful, page-turning and redemptive story of a mother’s gripping journey across the Caribbean to find her stolen children in the aftermath of slavery. Eleanor Shearer is a mixed-race writer and the granddaughter of Windrush generation immigrants. She splits her time between London and Ramsgate on the English coast so that she never...

Barbara Jenkins writes about the experiences of a personal and family-centred life in Trinidad with great psychological acuteness, expanding on the personal with a deep awareness of the economic, social and cultural contexts of that experience. She writes about a childhood and youth located in the colonial era and an adult life that began at the very point of Trinidad’s independent nationhood, a l...

"An Unending Search", by Ryan Bachoo is a novel set in South Trinidad in the late 1970s. It follows the story of Tar, a young man who dreams of escaping poverty and systemic racism. Inspired by Uncle Sundar, Tar's journey is one of hope and ambition, ultimately leading him to New York or London. The novel explores themes of identity, racism, and classism, painting a vivid picture of...

“The Trouble with the Dog” by Stefan Bindley-Taylor was awarded the 2024 BCLF Elizabeth Nunez Caribbean-American Writer’s Prize. This category was judged by Lauren Francis-Sharma, Desmond Hall and Wandeka Gayle. From the judges: ‘It is, at first, an exploration of a twisting familial relationship that embodies the hopes and expectations that live between perception and actuality. But with a sure h...

There is bad luck in New Felicity. The people of the small coastal village have taken in Milagros, an 11-year-old Venezuelan refugee, just as Trinidad’s government has begun cracking down on undocumented migrants—and now an American journalist has come to town asking questions. New Felicity’s superstitious fishermen fear the worst, certain they’ve brought bad luck on the village by killing a local...

Set in the heart of rural Jamaica, A HOUSE FOR MISS PAULINE (Algonquin Books), from award-winning author Diana McCaulay, tells the captivating, tender tale of Pauline Sinclair—a fiercely independent 99-year-old Jamaican woman who built her own home from the ruins of a plantation. As she faces her 100 th birthday, the old stones of her house begin to rattle and shift and call out mysterious message...

Casualties of Truth, inspired by Francis-Sharma’s time at South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation’s Amnesty Hearings, is a gripping tale that explores themes of justice, revenge, race, parenting, and of course, the complications of friendship. It is a riveting literary novel with the sharp edges of a thriller about the abuses of history and the costs of revenge, set between Washington, D.C., and J...

Love sorrel at Christmas? Thank Anancy, that trickster spider, for the drink all West Indians eagerly enjoy during the festive Yuletide season! In this episode, Ms. Velma Pollard, revered Jamaican author and oral storyteller, shares the backstory of sorrel’s infamous association with Christmas in a folktale that originated in Jamaica.  This telling is adapted from a story by Ms. Louise Bennet, Jam...