With a New Introduction by Edwidge Danticat
Me Dying Trial, Patricia Powell's masterful debut novel, establishes her as a major voice in Caribbean literature. Gwennie Augusta Glaspole, a schoolteacher, is trapped in an unhappy marriage and quickly saddled with six children. Gwennie resists Jamaican cultural expectations of playing dutiful wife and mother, struggling in a loveless, often abusive relationship, she eventually relocates to Connecticut. Dealing with issues of religion, sexuality, immigration, domestic violence, and gender inequality, Powell has proven to be "a Generation-X vanguard for the Caribbean literary world" (
Boston Magazine), and much more.