{"product_id":"camilles-lakou-hardcover","title":"Camille's Lakou - Hardcover","description":"\u003cdiv\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: right;\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/reportcopyrightinfringement.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\"\u003e\u003cb\u003eReport copyright infringement\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\u003cp\u003eby \u003cb\u003eMarie Léticée\u003c\/b\u003e (Author), \u003cb\u003eKevin Meehan\u003c\/b\u003e (Translator), \u003cb\u003eMarie Léticée\u003c\/b\u003e (Translator)\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eCamille has worked her way up from the Guadeluopean lakou where she was born and raised to the heights of Orlando, where she is a successful motivational speaker. Her assistant, Evelyn, is struggling as a single mother, especially since she has been keeping the existence of her son a secret from her family in Jamaica. As Camille relates the story of her life to Evelyn, she urges Evelyn to see her difficult life as one of great fortune--\"My girl, a woman falls, but she never despairs\"--and to fully share her joys and successes with her loved ones. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eCamille's Lakou\u003c\/i\u003e tells the story of Camille, a young Caribbean girl living with her single-parent mother in a 1960s urbanized zone at the edge of Pointe-à-Pitre, Guadeloupe, following her through her adult life as a Caribbean migrant in Florida. Author Marie Léticée explores neocolonial culture clash and identity conflict themes that will be familiar to readers of the Francophone Caribbean coming-of-age novel and its revisions by women writers such as Capécia, Lacrosil, Manicom, Schwarz-Bart, Condé, Pineau, and others. Léticée makes it her own by fleshing out a time and place not well-represented in Guadeloupean literature. While previous \u003ci\u003ebildungsromane\u003c\/i\u003e from the writers mentioned here typically focus on rural peasant or urban bourgeois settings, \u003ci\u003eCamille's Lakou\u003c\/i\u003e shifts location to an impoverished urban environment. \"Lakou\" is translated as \"courtyard\" or, more colloquially, \"yard.\" The author explores the culture and politics of lakou society while raising the issue of how this social dynamic is transformed through the impact of globalization and dispersal into a diasporic experience outside the island milieu of Camille's childhood. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e In a collaborative translation effort between the author and Kevin Meehan, \u003ci\u003eCamille's Lakou\u003c\/i\u003e will bring the realities and joys of Léticée's Guadeloupe to an English audience for the first time.\u003ch3\u003eAuthor Biography\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eMarie Léticée\u003c\/b\u003e is the pen name of the multimedia, multilingual Guadeloupean writer and educator Akosua Fadhili Afrika. Her first novel, originally titled \u003ci\u003eMoun lakou\u003c\/i\u003e, was published by Ibis Rouge Éditions, a French Guyanese press, in 2016. A sequel, \u003ci\u003eDu haut de l'autre bord\u003c\/i\u003e, appeared in 2020 and charts the further development of characters introduced in \u003ci\u003eMoun lakou\u003c\/i\u003e. Both novels are now distributed by Orphie Éditions, which acquired Ibis Rouge in 2021, and a third volume is in progress. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003eKevin Meehan\u003c\/b\u003e is a professor of English and Caribbean studies at the University of Central Florida. He is the author of \u003ci\u003ePeople Get Ready: African American and Caribbean Cultural Exchange\u003c\/i\u003e and articles published in journals including \u003ci\u003eCallaloo\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eSmall Axe\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eNarrative\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eTulsa Studies in Women's Literature\u003c\/i\u003e. He and Marie Léticée have previously published their co-translations of Haitian poetry.\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eNumber of Pages:\u003c\/strong\u003e 160\u003c\/div\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eDimensions:\u003c\/strong\u003e 0.63 x 9.13 x 6.06 IN\u003c\/div\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003ePublication Date:\u003c\/strong\u003e August 15, 2025\u003c\/div\u003e\n            ","brand":"BooksCloud","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47267783999737,"sku":"9780826507686","price":179.91,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0789\/2782\/3097\/files\/khK-XVjIWA9780826507686.webp?v=1768868723","url":"https:\/\/bookscloud.io\/products\/camilles-lakou-hardcover","provider":"BooksCloud Book Dropshipping","version":"1.0","type":"link"}