8 Caribbean Books That Shaped My Writing

2026 marks 8 years of celebrating Read Caribbean Month- shout out to Book of Cinz for leading this very important movement! Reading Caribbean books has changed my life in more ways than one. Perhaps the greatest evidence of that is in the writer I have grown into through engaging with the work of some powerful writers from across the region. In honour of this 8-year milestone, I’m highlighting 8 Caribbean books that shaped my writing. Books that helped me lean into authenticity and truth… and strengthened my passion for telling stories that are uniquely ours.

1. Beka Lamb- Zee Edgell 🇧🇿

Let’s start all the way back in secondary school, when we read this book for Literature class, and I saw myself in a novel for the first time. I had read widely before that, but I had never before read about little girls who sounded like me, lived in communities like mine, and played the same games my friends and I did. That changed a lot for a young girl who loved writing, but previously only wrote stories about girls whose experiences were nothing like mine. It signalled the end of writing about blonde pigtails, snow angels, and knitted sweaters.

2. The Stall Keeper- Anderson Reynolds 🇱🇨

This book taught me that novels could actually be set in the small town I was from. They could feature the women I bought plums from on the same streets I walked to school. They could be about our history, our people, our experiences. It helped me realise that there is space in this world for stories not just from my island, but my home. And so I began to write what home means to me into my own stories.

3. Things I Have Withheld- Kei Miller 🇯🇲

Through this collection, I learned that books about the Caribbean don't need to be fiction. They could be raw, real essays about the ordinary and extraordinary parts of our lives. Essays that are unapologetically poetic, personal, and profound, laying bare our realities- from ugly stories of discrimination, sexual abuse, and violence, to beautiful accounts of survival, friendship, and hope. That gave me permission to write our truths without the mask of fiction.

4. The Dragon Can't Dance- Earl Lovelace 🇹🇹

Earl Lovelace helped me grow to appreciate how lyrical our prose can be, simply by virtue of how poetic we are as a people. How colourful our characters are. The vividness of the sounds and scenes that make up the carnival of our lives. Lovelace is a masterful storyteller, and his work has made me view the cast of characters in my own life differently. I look around me now, recognising poets and philosophers everywhere, and striving to represent their voices in my own work.

5. The Counting House- David Dabydeen 🇬🇾

I read about Indians crossing the ocean for the Caribbean and all the hopes and dreams they carried with them on those ships. It made me want to know more about indentureship, about my maternal great-grandparents, and how their journey to Guyana ultimately shaped my own life. I began asking questions. Doing research. Taking notes. Sometimes fiction can spark a transformative quest for truth that shapes not only our writing but our understanding of self.

6. How To Say Babylon- Safiya Sinclair 🇯🇲

I was 30 reading about a Caribbean girl cutting off her dreadlocks... and crying for my 12-year-old self, finally acknowledging my own feelings around giving up my hijab. I appreciated how raw and honest this memoir was. It helped me make sense of the significant role my religious upbringing played in my life, and the vulnerability I felt after giving up something that had so visibly marked me as ‘different’. Safiya’s bravery in writing her story gave me the courage to write about mine.

7. When We Were Birds- Ayanna Lloyd Banwo 🇹🇹

Myth, magic, and ancestral spirits were not subjects I expected to feature in my writing. Until I read this fantastic novel that presented magical realism and Caribbean folklore in an incredibly contemporary and relatable context. Ayanna Lloyd Banwo opened the door for me to explore speculative fiction on my own terms, and it has opened beautiful possibilities for me as a Caribbean storyteller.

8. We're Alone- Edwidge Danticat 🇭🇹

It all came together for me in this collection of essays. Reading them helped me recall how stories saved and inspired me as a child. How books taught me about home, and the world, and made me understand the power of words. Most importantly, Danticat’s essays reminded me of the importance of not remaining silent. That empowered me to write about my unique worldview, my relationship with writing, and finding my purpose as a storyteller.

First published 14 June 2026 on Wandering Through Wisdom by Amanie Mathurin on Substack. Republished with permission.