Black Beach
Black Beach
Blazing sunlight scorched Tamera’s limbs almost as much as the Trinidad moruga scorpion hot pepper she’d ingested after a dare from her older sister, Mary, charred her insides. She climbed into her father’s car, and waved goodbye to her cousin, Azura. Tamera exhaled loudly, fanning herself with her hand. “It’s really hot out here,” she moaned.
“Like fire.” Earl, Tamera’s father, mopped up the sweat oozing down his forehead with a handkerchief he pulled from his shirt pocket. He swerved onto the street, veering left to escape a pothole. They listened to R&B, hip-hop, and soca music on the radio as he and his daughter headed home.
Earl pulled up at a red light and patted his daughter’s knee. “Your mother’s not doing too well this week,” he said.
Tamera, 16, has a lot on her mind. Her boyfriend, Dalton, is working away from home, her mother is sick again, and Tamera is worried about her future. What will she do after she takes the exams for the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate? She knows she will have to get good marks if she wants to continue on to a higher degree, but she really has no idea if she wants to continue with her schooling or what she wants to do with her life. Living in the small coastal community of La Cresta may seem idyllic to outsiders with the beautiful weather and gorgeous beaches, but the locals worry about the environment, isolation, and the economy.
The location of La Cresta plays a large role in Glynis Guevara’s description-laced narrative. She has taken great pains to introduce the reader to Tamera’s world which has problems that need facing, questions with no answers, beauty, and pain. In short, Guevara stripped off the top layer of the tourist’s Caribbean experience to present a darker but also more realistic version of the beautiful island. Tamera’s world has oil spills that threaten fishing stocks, and endangered turtles’ nesting sites are being destroyed. Tamera’s world also has a caring, close-knit family filled with people who look after each other as well as their community. It has parties, celebrations, and personal disasters.
Although Black Beach is a coming-of-age story, it also tackles a plethora of other issues, including the sex trade, environmental degradation, and mental health. Tamara also has to contend with a sexual predator, a missing school mate, and pressures from a boyfriend to take some “candid” photographs. Guevara also has Tamara grapple with concepts of divorce, injury, and even death, not to mention whether she should continue with her schooling. The book is loaded with issues. Unfortunately, it is difficult to delve with any depth into these complex concerns with so many other plot points clamouring for attention. The result is a splintered narrative which can be difficult to follow.
Tamara’s personal struggle with her mother’s mental illness, coupled with her growing frustration with her long distance relationship, will be relatable to many teens. The lush description may spark the reader’s curiosity about the Caribbean’s environment and animal life. The stilted language, however, does not invite the reader into the story.
There is enough content between the pages of Black Beach for several novels. It is a pity that the author was unable to take the space needed to tell the all the stories she began in Black Beach.
Jonine Bergen is a librarian in Winnipeg, Manitoba.