head
COMICS   •   MOVIES   •   MUSIC   •   TELEVISION   •   GAMES   •   BOOKS
Book Review: The Jumbies By Tracey Baptiste
  |  @   |  

The Jumbies
Hardcover | Paperback | Kindle Edition
Written by Tracey Baptiste
Algonquin Young Readers
Paperback Release Date: August 26th, 2016

Corrine and her father live a peaceful life. Her mother died when she was younger, and they are all each other has. One day, two boys tie her mom’s necklace to an agouti (small mammal that looks kind of like a squirrel minus the bushy tail), making her chase after it into the forbidden forest. She gets spooked in there, especially when she sees yellow eyes. She runs out of the forest and into her father, who teases her about getting scared by a jumbie (spirit). She scoffs and they walk away, and the jumbie appears. Such is the beginning of Tracey Baptiste‘s The Jumbies.

More below.

As with some of our favorite fairy tales, a beautiful woman enters their lives and mesmerizes her father. But Corrine is not fooled and neither are we. Severine is the jumbie that has a connection to Corrine’s family (no spoilers), wants a family of her own, and the entire island while she’s at it. Corrine must make her father and everyone else on the island see Severine for who she really is.

Tracey Baptiste brings Caribbean folklore to the masses, which makes this novel not only good for kicking back with a good book for fun, but a way for educators to immerse adolescents in cultural literature, while engaging young readers with the supernatural. That our heroine is a young girl with her male sidekicks is the icing. Children as the heroes, surrounded by unsuspecting or disbelieving adults is a timeless theme that transcends generations and cultures. Although targeting young readers, I enjoyed this story immensely and read it with my children as well. The language could have been a little more descriptive, but that did not deter from the essence of the story.

Book synopsis:

Corinne La Mer claims she isn’t afraid of anything. Not scorpions, not the boys who tease her, and certainly not jumbies. They’re just tricksters made up by parents to frighten their children. Then one night Corinne chases an agouti all the way into the forbidden forest, and shining yellow eyes follow her to the edge of the trees. They couldn’t belong to a jumbie. Or could they?

When Corinne spots a beautiful stranger at the market the very next day, she knows something extraordinary is about to happen. When this same beauty, called Severine, turns up at Corinne’s house, danger is in the air. Severine plans to claim the entire island for the jumbies. Corinne must call on her courage and her friends and learn to use ancient magic she didn’t know she possessed to stop Severine and to save her island home.

2 Comments »

  1. Thanks so much for the review!

    Comment by Tracey — April 26, 2016 @ 4:58 pm

  2. Your welcome! Thanks for the lovely book!

    Comment by Olympus Athens — April 26, 2016 @ 5:29 pm

RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URL

Leave a comment

Previous Article
Next Article
«
»
You may have noticed that we're now AD FREE! Please support Geeks of Doom by using the Amazon Affiliate link above. All of our proceeds from the program go toward maintaining this site.
2023  ·   2022  ·   2021  ·   2020  ·   2019  ·   2018  ·   2017  ·   2016  ·   2015  ·   2014  ·  
2013  ·   2012  ·   2011  ·   2010  ·   2009  ·   2008  ·   2007  ·   2006  ·   2005
Geeks of Doom is proudly powered by WordPress.

Students of the Unusual™ comic cover used with permission of 3BoysProductions
The Mercuri Bros.™ comic cover used with permission of Prodigal Son Press

Geeks of Doom is designed and maintained by our geeky webmaster
All original content copyright ©2005-2023 Geeks of Doom
All external content copyright of its respective owner, except where noted

This website is licensed under
a Creative Commons License.
About | Privacy Policy | Contact