“Picture that weird and wonderful transition from night to day. Simultaneously slow and sudden. The orphic moment where the early morning resembles the dusk. The way dew-dropped spiderwebs hang undisturbed under the shade of snapdragon pods. The little trenches of compressed grass the red-rumped agoutis leave behind as they scurry.” ‘Hungry Ghosts’ – the new novel from the hot-to-trot Caribbean author Kevin Jared Hosein – is filled with such evocative passages. The story takes us back to central Trinidad circa the 1940s. One of its key locations is a hill overlooking Bell Village. On the hill is the Changoor farm, which houses Dalton and Marlee Changoor, who live in luxury in a colonial pile. One of the men who work on the farm is Hans Saroop. He lives with his wife and son in a ramshackle village, which has been constructed from bits of wood and tin. The village also houses a clutch of families who live on top of each other. When Dalton Changoor goes missing one day, Marlee becomes concerned – not so much for the fate of her husband (it soon transpires they have a history, not all of it good), but because she’s all alone in a huge house. When she suspects she’s being targeted by local ne’er-do-wells, she asks Hans to act as a night watchman. Hosein has conjured up a wholly believable and immersive milieu, which acts as a backdrop to an engrossing and thematically rich tale that touches on everything from class to violence, family roots to religion. It’s a novel absolutely teeming with the sights and sounds of the era, and I wouldn’t be surprised if ‘Hungry Ghosts’ received multiple nominations when awards season rolls round. RM

Bloomsbury