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A Novel
by Nicole Dennis-Benn
A young model is catapulted from her life in Jamaica to the international world of high fashion in this tender, powerful novel about the distance one woman must travel to find out what it means to be truly free—by the critically acclaimed and award-winning author of Patsy and Here Comes the Sun.
Nestled within Jamaica's Blue Mountains, Cherry Village has belonged for generations to the Maroons—freed slaves descended from Faye's ancestor, the legendary Grandy Henrietta. But Faye's restless nature and independence have always marked her as different, and she dreams of a life beyond the rural coffee-farming community that follows the old ways. When Faye's mother is forced to sell their ancestral land after falling ill, Faye worries she will be trapped forever.
A chance meeting with a modeling scout offers Faye the opportunity to save her family and pursue the freedom she craves. Her career will take her on a whirlwind journey of luxury and excess, love and adventure, as well as greed and deception. But her success will challenge everything she thought she knew about herself, forcing her to confront a legacy of pain, resilience, and survival that began generations before.
A story of land and river, myth and history, unbreakable hope and generational resilience, interwoven with Jamaican folklore and featuring an unforgettable heroine, Black Gold further establishes Nicole Dennis-Benn as one of the most dynamic voices in contemporary fiction.
"With exquisite storytelling and vivid, lush descriptions, Nicole Dennis-Benn's Black Gold takes readers through Jamaican history, the land and labor coffee growers, the contemporary fashion industry, and the complications of family, romance, and love. Every step of the way is captivating." —Imani Perry, National Book Award–winning author of South to America
"Sexy and entrancing ... In this mesmerizing tale, glamour, seduction, and the quest for self-actualization whisk readers from the coffee fields of Jamaica to the sensuous fashion houses of Paris, and beyond... . A wholly enthralling read you can't help but love." —Jonathan Escoffery, Booker Prize finalist and bestselling author of If I Survive You
This information about Black Gold was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Nicole Dennis-Benn is the critically acclaimed, bestselling author of Here Comes the Sun and Patsy. A two-time Lambda Literary Award winner and a recipient of a National Foundation for the Arts Grant, Nicole Dennis-Benn is a Visiting Associate Professor in Creative Writing at Bryn Mawr College. Born and raised in Kingston, Jamaica, she lives with her wife and their two children in Brooklyn, New York.
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