Adding How to Love a Jamaican to the growing list of great short story collections I’ve read so far in 2021 - and it’s only February! This collection has the overarching theme of Jamaican immigrants and their families back home in Jamaica, so it felt like a cohesive collection yet each story felt distinct and stood on its own two feet. Alexia Arthurs writes about such a broad range of characters, young and old, queer and straight, rich and working class and she gets inside all their heads.

.

I think there was only one story I didn’t really care for (Mash-Up Love) and the rest were all a love or like scenario! I thought the start and end stories, Light-Skinned Girls and Kelly Rowlands and Shirley from a Small Place, were particularly strong so it was excellent to start and finish the collection on such high notes. But my favourite was probably We Eat Our Daughters. There are a few stories in this collection dealing with parent/child relationships, but this one was my favourite!

.

Sometimes with collections with overarching themes, the stories can blur together, but I was really impressed with how Arthurs manages to situate the reader afresh with each new story. The characters feel like they have the depth of characters from a novel, always a sure sign of an excellent short story!

.

@reads.and.reveries, @bookofcinz and @aishathebibliophile are all also fans of How To Love a Jamaican, that’s when you know it’s a winner 👏