MIDNIGHT ROBBER

 My novel Midnight Robber was published in 2000 by Warner Aspect in the US. It was my second novel. It’d been difficult enough to write one novel. I had no clue whether I could do it again. Turns out I could. In part, I wanted to do something that hybridized the three anglo-Caribbean vernaculars with which I’m familiar: Jamaican, Guyanese and Trinidadian. I also wanted to write a protagonist whose reputation develops differently than the reality of who she is as a person. I probably wanted to do other things as well, but that was over 20 years ago; who remembers?

From the publisher’s blurb: It's Carnival time and the Caribbean-colonized planet of Toussaint is celebrating with music, dance, and pageantry. Masked "Midnight Robbers" waylay revelers with brandished weapons and spellbinding words. To young Tan-Tan, the Robber Queen is simply a favorite costume to wear at the festival--until her power-corrupted father commits an unforgiveable crime.

Suddenly, both father and daughter are thrust into the brutal world of New Half-Way Tree. Here monstrous creatures from folklore are real, and the humans are violent outcasts in the wilds. Tan-Tan must reach into the heart of myth and become the Robber Queen herself. For only the Robber Queen's legendary powers can save her life . . . and set her free.