Cherie Jones (2021) How the One-Armed Sister Sweeps Her House. London, Tinder Press. 978-1-4722-6877-8

 

Set on the Caribbean island of Barbados, this novel highlights the huge inequalites between the White, foreign, villa-owning rich and the local poor Black and mixed-race population forced to hustle, hawk and sell their bodies to make a living. The stark inequality brings harms to them all.

[Trigger Warning: Domestic Violence and Abuse; Murder, Infanticide; Child Abuse; Elder Abuse; Incest; Rape]

[Spoiler alert]

The novel is not an optimistic one, filled with stories of child abuse, rape, incest, domestic violence and abuse, elder abuse and murder.

It tells the story of Lala, conceived through incest and rape, who marries a man she feels is strong and will enable her to have a happy home life and a family, while her childhood sweetheart is in jail. Adan is violent and abusive, and within an argument, shortly after he has murdered one of the rich men he was trying to rob, their baby is dropped and dies.

The story includes the machinations of the local police officer, angry at having officers brought in from outside handling the murder case. He is not easily fooled by the story of the baby being abducted and found dead on the beach.

The domestic violence and abuse between the two main characters, Adan and Lala includes coercive control, financial abuse - when he steals all the money she has saved and buried- physical violence and rape. Again, we have a perpetrator who is portrayed as consistently a low-life villain and a victim-survivor left with few options in life having come from an abusive childhood with her father and grandfather being one and the same.

Cherie Jones has said in several interviews* that she has experienced domestic abuse herself, not only personally as the victim-survivor, but also amongst her extended family. She has also said that the story of Lala is not her own story.

*https://www.essence.com/entertainment/cherie-jones-explores-race-class-and-domestic-violence-in-the-caribbean-in-her-debut-novel/

Awards:

·        Shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction (2021)

Brianna Labuskes (2019) Girls of Glass. Seattle, Thomas and Mercer. 978-1-503-90228-2

 

This is a murder mystery written from the point-of-view of the Detective looking to solve the abduction and murder of a six-year old child. Her involvement and detachment in the case is constantly questioned as previously her daughter had been abducted and murdered when she was four years old.

[Trigger Warning: Domestic Violence, Child Abuse, Incest]

[Spoiler alert]

Although the story is told by the detectives (in the third person) involved in investigating the disappearance and subsequent murder of a six-year old girl, the story revolves round a wealthy and powerful but toxic family living in a small town in Florida.

The family is headed up by a charming, narcissistic District Judge, secure in his role with all the right powerful connections. At home he is a sexual abuser to his two daughters, his granddaughter and with clear intent on his daughter/granddaughter as she matures. His wife maintains a perfect, wealthy family façade while exerting iron control over the family at home. The abuse includes financial abuse, physical violence and close control of the movements of all four of the other female members of the household. The two daughters are in varying states of mental and physical collapse, coping with substance abuse and unable to parent their own children.

The book has an excellent plot as a murder mystery with twists and turns keeping you guessing until the final, unexpected, revelation and subsequent actions. However much of the writing is cliched and the characters two-dimensional. The abuse falls into the stereotypes of powerful, untouchable men (another US judge) abusing family members and getting away with it.