Disjointed. Interesting and engaging but I wanted a single story. ( )

I did some volunteer work in Jamaica in my younger years. I grew to love the Jamaican accent so it was lovely to listen to this book which is about a Jamaican-Canadian family and for which the narrator often lapses into that accent.

Kara Davis lives in Little Jamaica in Toronto with her mother and sometimes with her grandmother. We first meet her when she is on a young girl. On a visit to Jamaica she finds a pig's head in a refrigerator. Back home in Toronto she embellishes that story to her class-mates to tell them she killed the pig with a knife. She will go on to develop her story telling ability but on this occasion it gets her into trouble in school and subsequently with her mother and grandmother. We follow Kara through interconnected stories as she grows up. She is full of love for her mother and her grandmother but there are often conflicts between all three of these females. It is also difficult for Kara to negotiate between being Jamaican and being Canadian. Which is she? Is there some way she can be true to her roots and also a productive citizen of her new home? I enjoyed following Kara's coming of age. Maybe we will get more about her adulthood from Ms Reid-Benta??? ( )

This one has been on my radar all year! I was in and out of reading slumps due to the pandemic and inability to focus, so I missed out on joining the #ReadCaribbean buddy reads in May. However, I savored this one this month in our book club!







My Thoughts







Ooof! I really have been reading a fair amount of tense mother/daughter books this year! This one wasn't restricted to just one generation either, plus tied in many implications with cultural expectations between first and second generation Canadians.



The flow of this book was incredible. If it were not specified as a short story collection, I would have it pegged as a creative memoir or fiction-like memoir. The stories read like snapshots of Kara's life from age 10 to 19, and despite the disjoint in time, the story was seamless.



Each story subtly ties in the major themes of Black identity, culture and mother/daughter relationships, but I personally felt an emphasis on the identity at the start of the book, shifting to the relationships at the end of the book.



The characters, Kara, Eloise and Verna, are perfectly imperfect. Their ideals and communication left me frustrated at times because you can still see through the fights how they are tied to and love one another not matter what is going on.

“I wondered if all daughters fought with their mothers this way when they grew up.”

There are also many laugh out loud moments in this, from school kids ribbing, to the Kara's grandparents maddening fights.



I can see how this book has won so many awards, I cannot wait to see what else Reid-Benta gives us in the future!















I hope you enjoyed my thoughts on Frying Plantain. Have you read this? Tell me what you thought! 
This review was originally posted on ReadWithWine ( )

I read an oddly formatted digital galley of this book, so did not realize it was connected short stories until I got to the acknowledgments. It makes more sense now. I'm

These coming-of-age stories all feature the narrator Kara, during her teen years. She has been raised in Toronto and environs by her single mother Eloise, who had Kara when she herself was 17. Kara's father left when she was about 5. Eloise's mother, Kara's grandmother, is from Jamaica and has played a huge part in Kara's upbringing.

This book felt very much YA to me (high school though, not middle school). Just as Kara struggles with her mother's expectations regarding dress, grooming, behavior, dating (none), and schoolwork, Eloise struggles with her own mother's expectations. Kara also struggles with her identity as a Jamaican-Canadian , whether within her old heavily Caribbean neighborhood or at her new largely white "better" school. Kara's problems are true for most teens, and even more true for teens with immigrant parents or grandparents.

I enjoyed this book, I knew nothing of the Canadian Caribbean community, and it was interesting to find our about it in this book. Though it was a little too YA-ish for me, I think those that love YA books (teens or not) would very much enjoy this book. An author to watch. ( )

This came to my attention because it was long-listed for the 2019 Giller Prize. I'm always interested in the lives of people of other cultures living in Canada, and particularly so in Jamaican because my grandson's father lives in Jamaica.

Set in a Toronto suburb, these stories provided insight but no surprises. Maybe there was something in the water I was drinking the month I read this, but I found many books that month fairly forgettable, including this one, although perhaps a little less so. ( )