A powerful work of magical realism, The Salt Roads follows four connected stories of black queer women across time and space. Metante Mer is a medicine woman and slave in what would become Haiti, trying to survive. Jeanne Duval is the (historical) mistress and muse of poet Charles Baudelaire in 19th century Paris. Thais is a 4th century Egyptian prostitute and slave who goes on a pilgrimage. Between them all, in fragmentary BEATS and BREAKS is the African goddess Lasirén or Ezili, of water and love, who possesses characters and influences events.

There's a lot of style here, and a lot of power in the characters, even if the Lasirén sections are a little overwrought. There's a keen urgency to the loves and lusts of her characters. Yet, I can't help but shake the sense that this is a premise without a conclusion. The deconstruction of Jeanne and Thais (historical personages, even if in some cases scantily documented), works at cross purposes to the construction of Mer-as wise, as powerful, as good. This book says "Wouldn't it be cool if these people existed?", and then having created their existence, ends.