June is Caribbean (American) Heritage Month and Pride Month and Audiobook Appreciation Month, among other observances and holidays. As I always like to remind everyone, the purpose of these acknowledgments is to make a time for extra attention, celebration, honor and learning related to the particular subject, whether it’s about culture and identity, what’s going on in the world or domestically, or appreciation for ebooks and audiobooks because they deserve love.

According to the Institute of Caribbean Studies, “Caribbean immigrants have been contributing to the well-being of American society since its founding."

The Caribbean and West Indies have a rich and powerful history. Our identity is as colorful as hibiscus flowers, with a tapestry of arts and literature that, I strongly feel, is still not being appreciated enough. Just one example:  the Honorary Miss Lou, aka Louise Benett-Coverly, who is a beloved folklorist, poet, writer, and educator in Jamaica. But have you ever heard of her outside of her own country?

For more resources, The Brooklyn Caribbean Literary Festival and Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute are great go-tos.

Here are some of the books that made me burst with pride for my Island heritage (even though I was not born in Jamaica), and others I have come to read during the pandemic when I feel a helplessness I cannot put to words. My roots, even when far away, are always of the Island. Our stories are vast and wonderful in their own ways.

As a fellow West Indian - Jamaican GYAL Pride! - I wanted to write this post with several book suggestions to give you a taste of the Caribbean and West Indies, and Caribbean and West Indie-American. 

• Clap When You Land by Elizabeth Acevedo (ebook and eAudiobook also available)
• How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents by Julia Alvarez
• Trinidad Noir, edited by Lisa Allen-Agostini & Jeanne Mason
• ​​Creole Folktales by Patrick Chamoiseau
• Segu: A Novel by Maryse Condé; translated from the French by Barbara Bray
• King and the Dragonflies by Kacen Callender
• Dominicana by Angie Cruz (also eAudiobook)
• Create Dangerously: The Immigrant Artist at Work by Edwidge Danticat
• Planting Stories: The Life Of Librarian And Storyteller Pura Belpré by Anika Aldamuy Denise
• Here Comes the Sun and Patsy: A Novel by Nicole Dennis-Benn

• Drum Dream Girl: How One Girl's Courage Changed Music by Margarita Engle
• A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James (CD audiobook also available)
• At the Bottom of the River by Jamaica Kincaid
• In the Castle of My Skin by George Lemming
• Brown Girl, Brownstones by Paule Marshall
• Complete Poems by Claude McKay; edited and with an introduction by William J. Maxwell
• Things I Have Withheld: Essays by Kei Miller
• Prospero’s Daughter by Elizabeth Nunez
• Love After Love: A Novel by Ingrid Persaud
• Collected Poetry: 1948-1984 by Derek Walcott
• Land of Love and Drowning by Tiphanie Yanique