Disclaimer: I bought this book! Buy diversely!

Book: The Stars and the Blackness Between Them

Author: Junauda Petrus

Book Series: Standalone

Rating: 4/5

Diversity: Black MCs and side characters, lesbian and bisexual MCs, non-binary pronouns for side character, Trinidadian MC, MC with leukemia, f/f romance

Recommended For...: magical realism, romance, contemporaries

Publication Date: September 17, 2019

Genre: YA Magical Realism

Recommended Age: 16+ (domestic abuse TW, cancer TW, masturbation mentioned, suicide mentioned TW, romance, homophobia

Publisher: Dutton Books for Young Readers

Pages: 312

Synopsis: Trinidad. Sixteen-year-old Audre is despondent, having just found out she’s going to be sent to live in America with her father because her strictly religious mother caught her with her secret girlfriend, the pastor’s daughter. Audre’s grandmother Queenie (a former dancer who drives a white convertible Cadillac and who has a few secrets of her own) tries to reassure her granddaughter that she won’t lose her roots, not even in some place called Minneapolis. “America have dey spirits too, believe me,” she tells Audre.

Minneapolis. Sixteen-year-old Mabel is lying on her bed, staring at the ceiling and trying to figure out why she feels the way she feels–about her ex Terrell, about her girl Jada and that moment they had in the woods, and about the vague feeling of illness that’s plagued her all summer. Mabel’s reverie is cut short when her father announces that his best friend and his just-arrived-from-Trinidad daughter are coming for dinner.

Mabel quickly falls hard for Audre and is determined to take care of her as she tries to navigate an American high school. But their romance takes a turn when test results reveal exactly why Mabel has been feeling low-key sick all summer and suddenly it’s Audre who is caring for Mabel as she faces a deeply uncertain future.

Junauda Petrus’s debut brilliantly captures the distinctly lush and lyrical voices of Mabel and Audre as they conjure a love that is stronger than hatred, prison, and death and as vast as the blackness between the stars.

Review: Overall, I thought this was a well done book. I started it by reading and then finished it by listening to it on audiobook. The book has multiple POVs that all have distinct voices. I loved the character development of both of the main characters and I loved their relationship with each other. The book is beautifully wrote and incorporates magical realism in one of the best ways I’ve ever read. The book also has great world building and discusses a lot of real world topics.

However, the book has come under fire recently. Trinidadian reviewers state the book has bad representation of the Trinidad rep because of badly translated Creole and antiquated representation of what Trinidad is, so be mindful of that. I can’t speak for that but I will say to trust ownvoice reviewers and their interpretations. The book is also 10000x better in audiobook format and from what I’ve read the book is supposed to be told in oratory format.

Verdict: Recommend, but please be mindful of what Trinidadian reviewers say about the book.