Cherie Jones – författare

Women''s Prize for Fiction 2021SHORTLISTED

''Jones''s atmospheric debut has a multiracial, multigenerational cast who are brilliantly and even-handedly portrayed'' Sunday Times

''Rare is the first book that reveals the writer fully formed, the muscles and sinews of her sentences firm and taut, the voice distinctly her own'' Washington Post

''A hard-hitting and unflinching novel from a bold new writer'' Bernardine Evaristo

''A bright new star. Cherie Jones draws us with skill, delicacy and glorious style into a vortex of Bajan lives on the edge'' Diana Evans

In Baxter''s Beach, Barbados, Lala''s grandmother Wilma tells the story of the one-armed sister, a cautionary tale about what happens to girls who disobey their mothers.

For Wilma, it''s the story of a wilful adventurer, who ignores the warnings of those around her, and suffers as a result.

When Lala grows up, she sees it offers hope - of life after losing a baby in the most terrible of circumstances and marrying the wrong man.

And Mira Whalen? It''s about keeping alive, trying to make sense of the fact that her husband has been murdered, and she didn''t get the chance to tell him that she loved him after all.

HOW THE ONE-ARMED SISTER SWEEPS HER HOUSE is the powerful, intense story of three marriages, and of a beautiful island paradise where, beyond the white sand beaches and the wealthy tourists, lies poverty, menacing violence and the story of the sacrifices some women make to survive.

''An extraordinarily hard-hitting and evocative novel that packs a tremendous punch with its repercussions of generational trauma, pin-sharp characterisations and strong sense of place'' Daily Mail

Delores is losing parts of herself, her typing speed, her ability to say 'hi' to work colleagues, until she is no longer Delores at all, but bare-footed Queen Mapusa, child of Africa, proud mother of modern civilization. Etheline Elvira Ransom is lying in bed, with a pair of scissors under her behind, waiting to teach her bullying, errant man a lesson. Odetta is a 54-year-old wife and mother talking her way through the day of her secret abortion. The Burning Bush women are smoking cigars and weaving each other's wild blood-red hair into tight plaits, but the plaits won't hold: somewhere, the hair says, a Bush woman is dying.In these sometimes strange, funny, tragic and truthful stories, Cherie Jones weaves paths through the joys and suffering of women's lives. The writing occupies an in-between space between the magical and the realistic, exploring the tensions between the African folk wisdom Nanan passes on from the ancestors to her grand-daughter, and the colonised dictums that the mother in 'The Bride' offers her daughter about how a respectable woman lives. ('Remember how nappy you can look if you let yourself go.')The Burning Bush Women tells so many stories, so much life, in a rich variety of voices that stay with you long after closing the book. The talented short story writer can tell a lifetime in a few pages, and in this Cherie Jones ranks with the best.Cherie Jones lives and works in Barbados. She was the winner of the first prize in the 1999 Commonwealth Short Story Competition and a prize of £2,000.