Returning to the island of San Andrés, in the Caribbean Sea, after many years living in Mexico, forces Verónica Baruq, our main character, to question her relationship with her origins. An intriguing photograph of her great-grandparents and an eerie encounter with Maa Josephine, a Raizal old woman who she meets outside the First Baptiste Church, are only a couple of the triggers that begin to reveal the truth about her background. Her past not only puts the protagonist in contact with the island’s unknown history, but it also helps her understand the social movements which, between zouk and calypso, celebrate the Raizal identity, carry out ‘thinking rundowns’ and above all, resist.
A fascinating bildungsroman that brings to the fore the untold stories of the Afro-Caribbean population that inhabit this forgotten paradise.
WINNER OF ELISA MÚJICA PRIZE FOR NOVELS (Colombia, 2018)