Jamaica Road
By
Lisa Smith
Read by
Sapphire Joy
Release:
07/15/2025
Runtime:
13h 51m
Unabridged
Quantity:
Jamaica Road describes the journeys of its characters with loving and meticulous detail. Through the eyes of her heroine—the plucky, determined Daphne—Lisa Smith deftly portrays a world in flux, in which tenderness and solidarity thrive in spite of and in response to the pervasive and intertwined forces of racial, political, and patriarchal violence. A wise and moving tale of love, loss, redemption, and renewal.
Gina Chung, author of Sea Change and Green Frog
A transformative love story about two best friends who fall for each other, fall apart, and try to find their way back together in their tight-knit British-Jamaican community.
South London, 1981: Daphne is the only Black girl in her class. All she wants is to keep her head down, preferably in a book. The easiest way to survive is to go unnoticed.
Daphne’s attempts at invisibility are upended when a boy named Connie Small arrives from Jamaica. Connie is the opposite of small in every way: lanky, outgoing, and unapologetically himself. Daphne tries to keep her distance, but Connie is magnetic, and they form an intense bond. As they navigate growing up in a volatile, rapidly changing city, their families become close, and their friendship begins to shift into something more complicated. When Connie reveals that he and his mother “nuh land”—meaning they’re in England illegally—Daphne realizes that she is dangerously entangled in Connie’s fragile home life. Soon, long-buried secrets in both families threaten to tear them apart permanently.
Spanning one tumultuous decade, from the industrial docklands of the Thames to the sandy beaches of Calabash Bay, Jamaica Road is a deftly plotted and emotionally expansive debut novel about race and class, the family you’re born with and the family you choose, and the limits of what true love can really conquer.
South London, 1981: Daphne is the only Black girl in her class. All she wants is to keep her head down, preferably in a book. The easiest way to survive is to go unnoticed.
Daphne’s attempts at invisibility are upended when a boy named Connie Small arrives from Jamaica. Connie is the opposite of small in every way: lanky, outgoing, and unapologetically himself. Daphne tries to keep her distance, but Connie is magnetic, and they form an intense bond. As they navigate growing up in a volatile, rapidly changing city, their families become close, and their friendship begins to shift into something more complicated. When Connie reveals that he and his mother “nuh land”—meaning they’re in England illegally—Daphne realizes that she is dangerously entangled in Connie’s fragile home life. Soon, long-buried secrets in both families threaten to tear them apart permanently.
Spanning one tumultuous decade, from the industrial docklands of the Thames to the sandy beaches of Calabash Bay, Jamaica Road is a deftly plotted and emotionally expansive debut novel about race and class, the family you’re born with and the family you choose, and the limits of what true love can really conquer.
Release:
2025-07-15
Runtime:
13h 51m
Format:
audio
Weight:
0.0 lb
Language:
English
ISBN:
9798217078035
Publisher:
Penguin Random House
Praise