How To Say Babylon: A Jamaican Memoir

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SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2024 WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR NON-FICTION

'Vivid and empowering' GILLIAN ANDERSON

Heart-stoppingly gripping BERNARDINE EVARISTO

Dazzling TARA WESTOVER

A story about hope, imagination and resilience GUARDIAN
An award-winning, inspiring memoir of family, education and resilience.

Born in Montego Bay, Jamaica, where luxury hotels line pristine white sand beaches, Safiya Sinclair grew up guarding herself against an ever-present threat. Her father, a volatile reggae musician and strict believer in a militant sect of Rastafari, railed against Babylon, the corrupting influence of the immoral Western world just beyond their gate. To protect the purity of the women in their family he forbade almost everything.

Her mother did what she could to bring joy to her children with books and poetry. But as Safiyas imagination reached beyond its restrictive borders, her burgeoning independence brought with it ever greater clashes with her father. Soon she realised that if she was to live at all, she had to find some way to leave home. But how

How to Say Babylon is an unforgettable story of a young womans determination to live life on her own terms.

I adored this book Unforgettable ELIF SHAFAK

Electrifying OBSERVER

To read it is to believe that words can save MARLON JAMES

Breathless, scorching NEW YORK TIMES

Reviews

An electrifying memoir OBSERVER

A story about hope, imagination and resilience GUARDIAN

'Vivid and empowering' GILLIAN ANDERSON

Heart-stoppingly gripping BERNARDINE EVARISTO

Dazzling TARA WESTOVER

Glimmering laced with poetic voice TIME

Clear-eyed and courageous GUARDIAN

A breathless, scorching memoir NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW

Electrifying SPECTATOR

Lushly observed WASHINGTON POST

Stirring' ELLE

To read it is to believe that words can save MARLON JAMES

Unforgettable, mesmerising, heartbreaking and heartwarming' ELIF SHAFAK

Powerful moving EVENING STANDARD

Sinclair's lush, lyrical language makes everything feel alive RAVEN LEILANI

A memoir of liberation IRISH TIMES

Stunningly written iNEWS

An instant contemporary Caribbean classic MONIQUE ROFFEY

Atmospheric and completely absorbing DIANA EVANS

Essential JESMYN WARD

Gut-wrenching, soul-stirring, electrifying NICOLE DENNIS-BENN

Immersive, imagistic, honest RAYMOND ANTROBUS

Destined to become a feminist classic LISA ALLEN-AGOSTINI

Heart-warming, tender and fierce LILY DUNN

Author Bio

Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters Metcalf Award in Literature, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Poetry, and the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry. Cannibal was selected as one of the American Library Associations Notable Books of the Year, was a finalist for the PEN Center USA Literary Award and the Seamus Heaney First Book Award in the UK, and was longlisted for the PEN Open Book Award and the Dylan Thomas Prize. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, Granta, The Nation, Poetry and elsewhere. She is an Associate Professor of Creative Writing at Arizona State University.