The Hills Were Joyful Together

Bending and manipulating the linear narrative structures of conventional fiction, this stark and brutal novel—originally published in 1953—is a powerful reflection on colonial Jamaica and the condition of the urban poor, told through the voices and stories of several boldly drawn characters. Beginning with Surjue, a man arrested and imprisoned following a botched robbery, who struggles for survival within Jamaica’s colonial prison, this tale bears an unflinching and distressing realism that...