Author: Edwidge Danticat (ed.)
Publication Date: 7/12/2010
Publisher: Akashic Books
Haitians may be among the poorest people in the world, but they are rich in an imaginative spirit that has helped them endure centuries of poverty, political corruption, and natural disasters. "Haitian creativity has always been one of the country's most identifiable survival traits," writes novelist Danticat (The Dew Breaker) in her introduction to the latest entry (with Copenhagen Noir, see above) in Akashic's acclaimed noir series. Reflected in the country's vibrant visual arts and music, this creative genius also finds full expression in the 18 stories contributed by writers in Haiti and in the Haitian diaspora as well as two "blan" (white) Haitiphile authors (Madison Smartt Bell; Mark Kurlansky). A few of the tales are noir in the traditional crime fiction sense—Josaphat-Robert Large's "Rosanna" is a chilling tale of a kidnapping gone very, very wrong: tensions between an émigré sister and her stay-at-home sibling come to a deadly head after their mother's funeral in Katia D. Ulysse's sardonic "The Last Department." Others experiment with stretching the genre's boundaries. Gary Victor's "The Finger" branches into hallucinatory horror, while Kettly Mars's "Paradise Inn" is a study in existential surrealism (shades of Sartre's No Exit). VERDICT This anthology will give American readers a complex and nuanced portrait of the real Haiti not seen on the evening news and introduce them to some original and wonderful writers. [A portion of the profits will be donated to the Lambi Fund of Haiti; see Q&A with Danticat on p. 92.—Ed.]—Wilda Williams, Library Journal
