WINNER OF THE BOOKER PRIZE
"A must-read
about modern Britain and womanhood . . . An impressive, fierce novel
about the lives of black British families, their struggles, pains,
laughter, longings and loves . . . Her style is passionate,
razor-sharp, brimming with energy and humor. There is never a single
moment of dullness in this book and the pace does not allow you to
turn away from its momentum."--Booker Prize Judges
Bernardine Evaristo
is the winner of the 2019 Booker Prize and the first black woman to
receive this highest literary honor in the English language. Girl,
Woman, Other is a magnificent portrayal of the intersections of
identity and a moving and hopeful story of an interconnected group of
Black British women that paints a vivid portrait of the state of
contemporary Britain and looks back to the legacy of Britain's
colonial history in Africa and the Caribbean.
The twelve central
characters of this multi-voiced novel lead vastly different lives:
Amma is a newly acclaimed playwright whose work often explores her
Black lesbian identity; her old friend Shirley is a teacher, jaded
after decades of work in London's funding-deprived schools; Carole,
one of Shirley's former students, is a successful investment banker;
Carole's mother Bummi works as a cleaner and worries about her
daughter's lack of rootedness despite her obvious achievements. From
a nonbinary social media influencer to a 93-year-old woman living on
a farm in Northern England, these unforgettable characters also
intersect in shared aspects of their identities, from age to race to
sexuality to class.
Sparklingly witty
and filled with emotion, centering voices we often see othered, and
written in an innovative fast-moving form that borrows technique from
poetry, Girl, Woman, Other is a polyphonic and richly textured
social novel that shows a side of Britain we rarely see, one that
reminds us of all that connects us to our neighbors, even in times
when we are encouraged to be split apart.