Image Source: Collage of authors, sources credited below
Every year on November 1, Antigua and Barbuda celebrates its independence, marking the nation’s journey since gaining sovereignty in 1981 from Britain. Independence Day is more than a celebration of history. It is also a chance to engage with the voices, stories, and creative energy that give the twin‑island nation its character.
This year, Antigua & Barbuda is marking its 45th anniversary under the theme “Renaissance Rooted in Pride, Bounded by Prosperity for All.” Also, November 1 falls on a Sunday, which makes it a good day to stay in with a book.
To celebrate, we are honoring stories from 6 exceptional Antiguan and Barbudan writers. For readers in the United States, across the African diaspora, and all over the world, these books offer an opportunity to discover a Caribbean literary tradition with connections to broader Black experiences.
Photo credit: Facebook / Daunt Books
Jamaica Kincaid’s Girl and Mr. Potter
Start with her short story Girl, published in The New Yorker in 1978. It gives a glimpse into the lives and values of women in Antigua and Barbuda, which include rituals like hand-washing clothes, modesty, clothes making, vegetables grown in the country like ‘dasheen’, the suggested lewdness of ‘benna’, Antigua’s Calypso music, and more.
Then try Kincaid’s 2002 novel Mr. Potter, a story of class, culture, and broken family ties told through the life of a man his daughter never fully knew. When he dies, his estranged daughter returns to Antigua and connects with the legacy of her father’s life.
Kincaid accepted the Gothenburg Book Fair’s honorary award, The Mermaid, in September 2026, and she was named Columbia University’s 2026 Artist-in-Residence in African American and African Diaspora Studies.
Althea Prince’s Loving This Man
For readers interested in migration, relationships, and the challenge of starting over, Althea Prince’s novel, Loving This Man, published in 2001, is worth exploring. It tells a story of transformation by chronicling the journey of a Caribbean woman, Saychelle, who moves to Canada and struggles to find her footing in the midst of race and racism, migration, and her marriage. Althea, who is Antiguan-Canadian, intricately weaves the aforementioned concepts into the book, which was her first novel.
The novel may resonate with readers in the African diaspora who have experienced migration themselves or watched loved ones negotiate the distance between home and a new country.
Photo credit: Facebook / Joanne C. Hillhouse
Joanne C. Hillhouse’s Little Prissy Palmer and Musical Youth
Little Prissy Palmer tells of the intersections of class, ideals of success, literacy, the outcast, and an unlikely friendship between the main character, a schoolgirl named Prissy, and a pack of dogs.
For readers who enjoy stories about friendship, creativity, and finding one’s voice, Hillhouse’s novel Musical Youth is another good choice. A finalist for the Burt Award for Caribbean Literature, the story follows a group of young people whose lives intersect through music, ambition, and relationships.
Hillhouse is one of the islands’ most important literary figures. She founded the Wadadli Youth Pen Prize in 2004 to nurture young writers.
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Marie-Elena John’s Unburnable
What happens when family history contains secrets that have shaped generations? That question lies at the heart of Unburnable, the 2006 debut novel by Antiguan-born writer Marie-Elena John. It tells an intriguing story of generational heritage and inheritance, the politics of identity in Creole culture, gender roles and indigenous Dominican culture, Caribbean experiences in modern-day America, and a homecoming. In the novel, a once-revered medicine woman and matriarch in Dominica is hanged. Through the story of her life and the journeys of her daughter and granddaughter, powerful lessons about gender roles, colonialism, and multicultural identities are uncovered.
For readers interested in historical fiction that connects the Caribbean, Africa, and Black experiences in the United States, Unburnable offers a thought-provoking choice.
Photo credit: Facebook / Dorbrene E. O’Marde – Author
Dorbrene E. O’Marde’s King Short Shirt: Nobody Go Run Me: The Life and Times of Sir MacLean Emanuel
Published in 2014, King Short Shirt: Nobody Go Run Me: The Life and Times of Sir MacLean Emanuel is a biography of Sir McLean “King Short Shirt” Emanuel, one of Antigua’s most celebrated calypsonians. The book was longlisted for the 2015 OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, and it works both as a biography and as a history of Antiguan society.
Paget Henry’s Shouldering Antigua and Barbuda: The Life of V.C. Bird
For Independence Day, no book fits better than Henry’s 2010 Shouldering Antigua and Barbuda: The Life of V.C. Bird. It is a biography of Sir Vere Cornwall Bird, the labour leader and political figure who helped shape modern Antigua and Barbuda. He dominated the country’s political life from 1939 to 1994, and his achievements included independence from Britain. The book provides historical context for understanding the country’s journey to independence in 1981.
