Kiskadee girl - Maggie Harris

In the small Caribbean town of Guyana town on the South American coast, a fifteen year old schoolgirl is forced to face her father's sudden death, pre-empted by a strange foreboding.This memoir of growing up in the 50s and 60s reflects a society that was trying to find its path after centuries of slavery and colonialism. Life for teenagers was at a crossroads between tradition and discipline, political awareness and a new-found voice influenced by literature, the music of Donovan and the new reggae sound, and the movies of Britain and America. In a world within worlds, love and dreams exist side by side as a young girl on the cusp of maturity discovers her sensuality in the midst of her country's own movement towards independence.Kiskadee Girl vividly re-imagines Guyana, named from the Amerindian Land of Many Waters. The Berbice River runs like an artery through the book's emotional and geographical landscape, carrying tug-boats and ghosts, bauxite, bones, and long-forgotten stories.