Harare Review of Books

304 pages.

First published Mar 15, 2022.

Genre: Fiction.

This review first appeared in The Sunday Long Read, Issue 337, Mar 19, 2022.

Darwin is a young Rastafarian man who has lived a protected and isolated life with his mother in rural Trinidad. He has seen her financial struggles as a single mother, and has been looking for a job so he can assist her. He is offered a government job as a gravedigger in the large city of Port Angeles, but working with the dead is against his religion. He decides to take the job against his mother’s wishes.

Yejide is the youngest of a line of “bird women”, women who can communicate with the dead. She lives outside Port Angeles with her distant mother, and other members of her blended family.

When her mother dies, Yejide comes into her powers, and has to take her place at the head of the family. She meets Darwin in a strange vision at the time of her mother’s passing, and then physically, for the first time, at the cemetery, when she goes to arrange for her mother’s burial. Their connection is immediate, and deep.

This is an exceptional first novel, a well-written ghost story, and a love story. Most of the action happens at the cemetery, where Darwin gets tangled up with a dangerous criminal gang. The interior lives of Yejide and Darwin are well-explored, and the dark elements of the story are genuinely spooky.

Banwo is from Trinidad and Tobago, and lives in London.

Rated: 9/10.