Cover of Easy in the Islands

Easy in the Islands

A calypso singer named Lord Short Shoe consorts with a vampish black singer to bilk an American out of his pride and his only companion-a monkey. An entire island bureaucracy casually confounds the attempts of Tillman, a hotel owner, in his attempt to get his dead mother out of the freezer and into a real grave; stymied, he resorts to a highly unusual form of burial. Two poor islanders stumble into a high-class dance party one night and find themselves caught up in a violent encounter that just might escalate into revolution. And a young woman sails off into the romantic tropics with the man of her dreams, only to learn the hard way - as Eve did - that paradise is just another place to leave behind.

Read more

Winner of the National Book Award for first fiction, Easy in the Islands is a “stunning” (Washington Post) collection of stories by one of America’s foremost contemporary fiction writers. Infused with the rhythms and the beat of the Caribbean, these vivid tales...

Audience
adult
Length
medium · 224 pages

Click a tag to see books like this one that share it. Point at it (on a phone, tap it) for less of it instead.

Read it? Sign in to help tag it.

Liked Easy in the Islands? Here’s where I’d start.

These suit anyone who liked Easy in the Islands. Sign in and mark a few books for picks shaped around your own taste.

  1. Victory Over Japan: A Book of Stories Shares short stories, national book award, national book award winners
  2. Dale Loves Sophie to Death Shares national book award winners, national book award, national book awards
  3. A Crown of Feathers Shares national book award, short stories, national book award winners
  4. Ship Fever: Stories Shares short stories, national book award, fiction

“People who read Easy in the Islands tend to reach for these next.”

  1. The Waters of Kronos
  2. Ten North Frederick
  3. The Hair of Harold Roux
  4. Paco's Story

“If you want more of the same, start with these.”

  1. At the Bottom of the River
  2. By Love Possessed
  3. How to Escape from a Leper Colony
  4. Whispers from the Cotton Tree Root: Caribbean Fabulist Fiction

“If it was the short stories that hooked you, try one of these.”

  1. The Magic Barrel
  2. Fortune Smiles
  3. Refund
  4. Goodbye, Columbus and Five Short Stories

“These start from a similar idea, even if they go somewhere else with it.”

  1. Dead Island
  2. A Plot to Die For
  3. Looking for the Easy Life
  4. Don't Stop the Carnival