When We Were Birds: A Novel

Ayanna Lloyd Banwo

A mythic love story set in Trinidad, Ayanna Lloyd Banwo's radiant debut is a masterwork of lush imagination and exuberant storytelling—a spellbinding and hopeful novel about inheritance, loss, and love's seismic power to heal.

“Roots the reader in [Trinidad’s] traditions and rituals [...] in the glorious matriarchy by which lineage is upheld. The result is a depiction of ordinary life that’s full and breathtaking.” —The New York Times Book Review

In the old house on a hill, where the city meets the rainforest, Yejide’s mother is dying. She is leaving behind a legacy that now passes to Yejide: one St Bernard woman in every generation has the power to shepherd the city’s souls into the afterlife. But after years of suffering her mother’s neglect and bitterness, Yejide is looking for a way out.

Raised in the countryside by a devout Rastafarian mother, Darwin has always abided by the religious commandment not to interact with death. He has never been to a funeral, much less seen a dead body. But when the only job he can find is grave digging, he must betray the life his mother built for him in order to provide for them both. Newly shorn of his dreadlocks and his past, and determined to prove himself, Darwin finds himself adrift in a city electric with possibility and danger.

Yejide and Darwin will meet inside the gates of Fidelis, an ancient and sprawling cemetery, where the dead lie uneasy in their graves and a reckoning with fate beckons them both.

Posts about this title from The Inky Phoenix

Playing catch up!

March 2022: WHEN WE WERE BIRDS This book is pure poetry. Like a humid dream caught in a graveyard. This mythical love story isn’t one you’ll soon forget.

April 2022: REMARKABLY BRIGHT CREATURES The world clearly needs more stories narrated by octopi. This is a story of loss, unusual friendships, and feels like a big hug — with suckers.

May 2022: KAIKEYI A reimagining of the famed Indian epic, The Ramayana, this spotlights the traditionally vilified queen as our heroine. A robust journey into a world destiny, gods, and complicated magic.

June 2022: OUR CROOKED HEARTS A juicy poisonous apple of a read that crunches with every bite. The perfect witchy romp. Ms. Albert delivers every time!