Gloria
Gloria is Kerry Young’s evocative second novel, continuing her powerful exploration of Jamaican life and identity.
Jamaica, 1938. Gloria Campbell is sixteen years old when a single violent act changes her life forever. She and her younger sister flee their hometown to forge a new life in Kingston. As all around them the city convulses with political change, Gloria’s desperation and striking beauty lead her to Sybil and Beryl, and a house of ill-repute where she meets Yang Pao, a Kingston racketeer whose destiny becomes irresistibly bound with her own.
Sybil kindles in Gloria a fire of social justice which will propel her to Cuba and a personal and political awakening that she must reconcile with the realities of her life, her love of Jamaica and a past that is never far behind her.
Set against the turbulent backdrop of a country on the cusp of a new era, Gloria is an enthralling and illuminating story of love and redemption.
Published: Bloomsbury 2013
Bloomsbury UK
Shortlisted for the East Midlands Book Award 2013
Longlisted for the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature 2014
Nominated for the 2015 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award.
‘A vivid portrayal … Kerry Young’s heartfelt, sparky and affecting debut novel is a chronicle of multicultural Jamaica, both in its cultural richness and in its strife and tensions’ – Guardian
‘A blindingly good read … both for its mesmeric story-telling and the quality of its prose’ – Observer
‘A vivid portrayal … Kerry Young’s heartfelt, sparky and affecting debut novel is a chronicle of multicultural Jamaica, both in its cultural richness and in its strife and tensions’ – Guardian
‘A blindingly good read … both for its mesmeric story-telling and the quality of its prose’ – Observer