Category Archives: Caribbean Lit News This Week

New Activity Book Just in Time for Summer

Miss Heidi’s The Crumb Bunch Activity Book hit the online bookstores today.

The book, which includes a variety of colouring pages, word searches, mazes, dot-to-dot’s and more, will keep kids busy for hours. The Crumb Bunch Activity Book is a companion to The Crumb Bunch story and includes drawings by Kitwana Julius.

The Crumb Bunch Activity Book is CaribbeanReads’ second activity book. The first is A Colouring Book Tour of St. Kitts-Nevis by Joan Mallalieu

Available on Amazon and book stores near you.

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Burt Award for Caribbean Literature Now Open for Submissions

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS

Now in its fifth year, the Burt Award for Caribbean Literature recognizes up to three English-language literary works for young adults (aged 12 through 18) written by Caribbean authors.

CaribbeanReads has had the pleasure of publishing two Burt Award winners, 2nd place winner in 2014 Musical Youth by Joanne C. Hillhouse and 3rd place winner in 2016 The Protectors’ Pledge by Danielle Y. C. McClean.

This year, the winning title will be awarded $10,000 CDN, and two finalists will be awarded $2,000 CDN each.

Publishers of winning titles will be awarded a guaranteed purchase of up to 2,500 copies, which will be donated to schools, libraries, and literacy organizations throughout the region. To date, more than 22,000 copies of winning books have made their way into the hands of Caribbean youth.

Published books, previously self-published books, and unpublished manuscripts are eligible for the award. Eligible books and unpublished manuscripts may be submitted to the Bocas Lit Fest by publishers registered and operating in the Caribbean. Unpublished manuscripts or previously self-published books may be submitted by authors directly to the Bocas Lit Fest.

Books published between 1 November 2016 and 31 October 2017 and eligible manuscripts must be received at the office of the Bocas Lit Fest by 31 October 2017.

See attached for the official 2018 guidelines and entry form. More information at http://www.bocaslitfest.com/2018/burt-award/

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Summer Giveaway. Win a Free Book!

CaribbeanReads is sponsoring a giveaway of the award-winning title, The Protectors’ Pledge. Enter to win a copy. Open to readers with addresses in Trinidad, the US, the UK, and Canada.

Be sure to read our other award-winning titles and our entire book list.

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CaribbeanReads June 2017 New Titles

View our catalog of new titles and our previous catalog to see what you missed.

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The Protectors’ Pledge in the US Capital

IMG_2180_cThird and fourth grade students at the Benjamin Orr Elementary School in DC were treated today to a visit from author and publisher Carol Mitchell of CaribbeanReads Publishing. Mrs. Mitchell was representing Danielle Y C. McClean author of The Protectors’s Pledge.

“The children were extremely attentive to the reading,” Mrs. Mitchell commented. “They begged me to continue after I stopped and we had a lively discussion about some of the ideas generated just in the first chapter, for example, parallels between mythical creatures of the Caribbean and creatures they have heard about, similarities between JV’s behavior towards his grandmother and their behavior towards their guardians, the significance of a Protector and a Pledge.”

The author, Ms. McClean made a surprise visit by video during the presentation.

Each of the children received a copy of The Protectors’ Pledge, bookmarks, and puzzles compliments of CaribbeanReads Publishing.

(Image-Carol Mitchell reading from The Protectors’ Pledge by Danielle Y. C. McClean)

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Sandy Point Handover

With the help of the Sandy Point Benevolent Society and other donors, CaribbeanReads was able to add a new school to the pilot program of Plant a Seed to Read, the initiative in which they provide culturally relevant books and curriculum support for the books to schools in the Federation of St. Kitts and Nevis. The handover was attended by Mr. William Hodge, Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Education in St. Kitts-Nevis.

Books include Adventure at Brimstone Hill, Oliver and Friends, Remember When, Lion Paw and Oliver, and Chee Chee in Paradise.

Mr. Hodge Speaking Hands Up for Reading Group Photo Presentation Mrs. Mason, Heidi and Carol

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Conversations Live! with author Danielle Y. C. McClean

Danielle Y. C. McClean, award winning author of The Protectors’ Pledge speaks on Conversations Live! with Cyrus Webb.Protectors pledge cover v3-Front

Mr. Webb highlights his admiration for the Protectors’ Pledge and its message of overcoming personal fears, making a difference in the world at any age, and respecting mother nature.  They talk about the way Danielle takes us into JV’s world and ties in culture with a social message.

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Literary Evening at the Grenadian Embassy DC

Mark your calendars for March 17, 2016. Four Caribbean authors will come together for an evening event at the Grenadian Embassy in Washington DC to discuss their books and literature in general. The evening will feature:

Force Ripe The Washington DC Book Launch of Force Ripe by Grenadian author Cindy McKenzie

Merle Collins Signing and Reading of Dame Hilda Bynoe: The Governor’s Story by Grenadian author Merle Collins


Full Front a Signing and reading of Hurricane of the Heart by Kittitian author, Jewel Amethyst Daniel.

Carol Mitchell-Author - HS Signing and reading by Kittivisian author Carol Ottley-Mitchell

The Embassy will supply light finger foods and drinks. Come out to enjoy an engaging evening. Thursday 17th March, 2016, 6:30 – 8:30 pm, 1701 New Hampshire Avenue, NW, Washington DC, 20009

 

grenada embassy event

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Lady of Parham shortlisted for the 2014 Guyana Prize for Literature Caribbean Award for Best Drama

Parham Village, Antigua is the setting of David Edgecombe’s 2014 play Lady of Parham which has been shortlisted for the 2014 Guyana Prize for Literature Caribbean Award for Best Drama.

The Caribbean Award, inaugurated in 2010, is open to writers who are citizens of any Caribbean territory. The Shortlist was decided by an independent panel of writers, critics and experts in the fields of literature, drama, culture and the arts.

Lady of Parham is based on an actual local legend and was told to Edgecombe by Antiguan entrepreneur Pam Arthurton. The play, which was first staged at the UVI Little Theatre in April 2014, tells the tale of five revelers who have come together to form a Carnival troupe but settle for dramatizing the tale of the Parham ghost, the beautiful Sarah Rumsey who murdered her husband’s uncle to take control of the wealth he had planned to use to educate Antigua’s slaves in the late 1650s. Sarah died in a mysterious fire shortly after and since then her ghost has haunted Parham Village looking for someone worthy to tell where she hid the gold. In the telling of the story, the revelers must confront the demons that threaten to derail their own lives.

Edgecombe has since produced Hubert Harrison, a play based on the life of the Virgin Islands’ civil rights activist and is in the process of
preparing for the twenty-fifth anniversary production of his hit play
Heaven.

For those who would like to know more about this Antiguan tale, Lady of Parham, published by CaribbeanReads, can be purchased at Best of Books in Antigua, bookstores in the USVI, or online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. It is also available on kindle.

Lady of Parham Media Kit: http://goo.gl/pKFAPW

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Free Stuff!

The Blessing of Charlie Sand CoverPublishers make mistakes. My daughter takes great pride in pointing out errors in the books that she reads and there are many, regardless of whether the book is published by large, medium, or small presses. I won’t get into the fact that small presses are held to a much higher standard than large ones so even the most minute of errors are highlighted as an indication of ineptitude. This post is not about that particular soapbox.

We have made errors at CaribbeanReads, not many, but they have existed. I remember publishing my first book, Adventure at Brimstone Hill and going back and forth with the printers about having a spine on the book although it was less than 100 pages. I was so focused on the existence of the spine that I did not notice a spelling error on it until after the first run.

Luckily there has not been anything quite as dramatic since, or at least none that we care to mention. That is up until the publication of The Blessing of Charlie Sand. We loved this story by Amanda Smyth right away, hunted down and hired the incredibly talented illustrator, Colin Bootman to do the illustrations, but for various reasons the execution of the first edition was not up to our usually high standards.

My dad used to tell the story of a Mercedes Benz breaking down and Mercedes replacing the car immediately and disavowing any knowledge of the incident whatsoever. We would love to do the same. We will be releasing the second edition of Charlie Sand in a few days, replacing all book store copies of the first edition, and obliterating the memory of edition one.

So, what about the free stuff? We’ll be hosting a giveaway in March for Charlie Sand. All you have to do is enter the contest, visit our FaceBook page and you will be entered to win a copy of the book. The giveaway starts on March 1 so keep a look out for more information.

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