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    Frying Plantain
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    Frying Plantain
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    Frying Plantain
    Audiobook4 hours

    Frying Plantain

    Written by Zalika Reid-Benta

    Narrated by Ordena Stephens-Thompson

    4/5

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    About this audiobook

    Kara Davis is a girl caught in the middle — of her Canadian nationality and her desire to be a “true” Jamaican, of her mother and grandmother’s rages and life lessons, of having to avoid being thought of as too “faas” or too “quiet” or too “bold” or too “soft.” Set in “Little Jamaica,” Toronto’s Eglinton West neighbourhood, Kara moves from girlhood to the threshold of adulthood, from elementary school to high school graduation, in these twelve interconnected stories. We see her on a visit to Jamaica, startled by the sight of a severed pig’s head in her great aunt’s freezer; in junior high, the victim of a devastating prank by her closest friends; and as a teenager in and out of her grandmother’s house, trying to cope with the ongoing battles between her unyielding grandparents.

    A rich and unforgettable portrait of growing up between worlds, Frying Plantain shows how, in one charged moment, friendship and love can turn to enmity and hate, well-meaning protection can become control, and teasing play can turn to something much darker. In her brilliantly incisive debut, Zalika Reid-Benta artfully depicts the tensions between mothers and daughters, second-generation Canadians and first-generation cultural expectations, and Black identity and predominately white society.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHouse of Anansi Press Inc Audio
    Release dateJan 7, 2020
    ISBN9781487008178
    Author

    Zalika Reid-Benta

    ZALIKA REID-BENTA is a Toronto-based writer whose debut short story collection, Frying Plantain, was longlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize. Frying Plantain was also nominated for the Forest of Reading Evergreen Award presented by the Ontario Library Association; appeared on must-read lists from Bustle, Refinery29, and Chatelaine to the Toronto Star, the Globe and Mail, and more; and was listed as one of Indigo’s Best Books of the Year. Zalika is the winner of the ByBlacks People’s Choice Award for Best Author, was the June 2019 Writer in Residence for Open Book, and was named a CBC Writer to Watch. She received an MFA in fiction from Columbia University, was a John Gardner Fiction Fellow at the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, and is an alumnus of the Banff Centre Writing Studio. Zalika is currently working on a young-adult fantasy novel drawing inspiration from Jamaican folklore.

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    Reviews for Frying Plantain

    4/5

    44 ratings2 reviews

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    • 5/5
      I love this book !! It was great to hear stories of Toronto and the surrounding areas and stops myself growing up in Mississauga I could picture these places.
      I could also relate to this book because I too have a Caribbean up bringing and a lot of it was true to heart
      So thank you for writing this I can’t wait for more
      Jeanine
    • 1/5
      The narrator’s accent meant the book lost its authenticity, for me, at least. Once I heard ‘plantain’ mispronounced, it was all over for me.