Buxton Spice

This sultry story of sexual-awakening is a must-read for everyone. Mothers, but this book for your daughters! It is both poetic and political, you will find it difficult to put down. It is truly a caribbean classic.

Oonya Kempadoo has written a perfectly charming account of a young girl's coming of age in Guyana. She has writtwn it in a sryle that gives the reader the feel of the action, of the environment. That is the emphasis, how it felt or smelt or tasted. I think she succeeds admirably, and through it all (to Lula), that Buxton Spice Mango Tree watches and remembers all the antics of the humans who live around it

Kempadoo is a true poet, and although BUXTON SPICE is billed as a novel, it is really more a collection of dances in which the poetics of language play a great part. With more and more literature appearing that does not follow the tight storylines of old, perhaps it is time for us to come up with another word to describe books such as Kempadoo's that are not-quite-novel, not-quite poetry, and not-quite-short-stories. Never mind that we don't have an official category for Kempadoo's fiction. It is strong enough and musical enough to dance on its own power. A series of short collage pieces show us a series of small moments that become suddenly huge in the life of a girl child in Guyana in the 70s. It is about early and uncomfortable awareness of race, sex, age, disability, and of the unpredictibility of politics. Kempadoo writes beautifully and naturally of sex. This is a strong point of hers, and it serves her well. The sex actually creates a sort of tension on which all of her stories ride. Oonya Kempadoo is young and she's talented. What she has done in BUXTON SPICE with language can most certainly be done again with a different theme. One can only wonder what Kempadoo will write about next. Will it be Guyana or England or . . .something entirely from her imagination? This is an author to watch. And, in the meantime, to read.

I found this novel enjoyable in that it relates from a child's (trying to be grown-up) point of view what it was like growing up in the 1970's in Guyana. It showed the subtle and obvious pieces of the ethnic situation and how a child takes to it naturally, especially if they are one of the privileged caste. The story centered around the growing sexuality of the narrator and all things in her life which influenced her thoughts on sex. While the book into not go into great detail on any one aspect of the unsettling situation in Guyana, I think this would make a good book club discussion relating to young girls in similar situations regarded their sexuality.

Oonya Kempadoo's "Buxton Spice" captures all the terror and wonder of the ending of childhood. It tells the story of Lula's awakening to boys, her own body, and to the brutal political structure of Guyana in the 1970's.The young woman's voice and her impressions ring terrifyingly true. Kempadoo delivers all the urgency and brutality of adolescent sexual discovery, set against the unfolding nightmare of a culture of abuse in a racist totalitarian state.Still, there is a real resonant beauty in this harsh tale that comes from Lula's innocence, and from her characterisation as a kind of free spirit, who identifies just as easily with trees and landscape as with people.Lula's honesty and the hard edge of her own self-knowledge carry the reader to a place of truth.