This anthology speaks to the fragility of our Caribbean home, but reminds the reader that although home may be vulnerable, it is also beautifully resilient. The voice of our literature declares that in spite of disasters, this people and this place shall not be wholly destroyed.
Anthology · Fiction · Short Stories
New Worlds, Old Ways
Speculative Tales from the Caribbean
edited by Karen Lord
“The Caribbean has a powerful, modern tradition of fantastic literature that’s on full display in this anthology of original fiction by writers from Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago, and Bermuda . . . None of these writers is likely to be familiar to American audiences, but all are worth getting to know. Readers who love the writing of Nalo Hopkinson, Tobias S. Buckell, and Lord herself will savour this volume.”
Available from Peepal Tree Press in the UK and Akashic Books in North America
About the book
Don’t be misled by the “speculative” in the title. Although there may be robots and fantastical creatures, these common symbols are tools to frame the familiar from fresh perspectives. Here you’ll find the recent past and ongoing present of government and society with curfews, crime and corruption; the universal themes of family with parents and children, growth and death, love and hate; the struggle to thrive when power is capricious and revenge too bittersweet. Here too is the passage of everything — old ways, places, peoples, and ourselves — leaving nothing behind but memories, histories, stories.
This anthology speaks to the fragility of our Caribbean home, but reminds the reader that although home may be vulnerable, it is also beautifully resilient. The voice of our literature declares that in spite of disasters, this people and this place shall not be wholly destroyed.
With stories by
- Tammi Browne-Bannister
- Summer Edward
- Portia Subran
- Brandon O’Brien
- Kevin Jared Hosein
- Richard B. Lynch
- Elizabeth J. Jones
- Damion Wilson
- Brian Franklin
- Ararimeh Aiyejina
- H.K. Williams
Linked names open the writer's profile in the Bocas Lit Fest A-Z directory.
Meet the author
Karen Lord
A Barbadian author and research consultant
KAREN LORD, a Barbadian author and research consultant, is known for her debut novel Redemption in Indigo, which won the 2008 Frank Collymore Literary Award, the 2010 Carl Brandon Parallax Award, the 2011 William L. Crawford Award, the 2011 Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Adult Literature, and the 2012 Kitschies Golden Tentacle (Best Debut), and was longlisted for the 2011 Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature and nominated for the 2011 World Fantasy Award for Best Novel. Her second novel The Best of All Possible Worlds won the 2009 Frank Collymore Literary Award, the 2013 RT Book Reviews Reviewers’ Choice Awards for Best Science Fiction Novel, and was a finalist for the 2014 Locus Awards. Its sequel, The Galaxy Game, was published in January 2015. She is the editor of New Worlds, Old Ways.
