The anthology Whispers From the Cotton Tree Root: Caribbean Fabulist Fiction was published by Invisible Cities Press in 2000. Sadly, it is now out of print.
The cotton tree, or silk cotton tree, is also called the ceiba; it's a tall tree with thick roots around which pits and caves form. Spirits are supposed to live in those pits and caves, and people will be cautioned to avoid the roots of the ceiba tree. Some people will tell you that it's actually the spirits of the ancestors that inhabit the roots of the silk cotton tree. History lives in those roots; memory. The metaphor of the cotton tree root was the organising theme of the anthology. The contributing authors are all of Caribbean heritage.
“...duppie and jumbie tales; skin-folk flights of fancy; rapsofuturist fables; your most dread of dread talks. Whispers From the Cotton Tree Root: Caribbean Fabulist Fiction is ... an anthology of fantastical fiction in Caribbean traditions...written from within a Caribbean or Caribbean diasporic context (and containing) fabulist, unreal, or speculative elements such as magic realism, fantasy, folklore, fable, horror, or science fiction. ”
