Mama Day

1989

by Gloria Naylor

Mama Day is a fascinating novel that reworks elements of Shakespeare's The Tempest. On the island of Willow Springs, off the Georgia coast, the powers of healer Mama Day are tested by her great niece, Cocoa, a stubbornly emancipated woman endangered by the island's darker forces.

This powerful generational saga is at once tender and suspenseful, overflowing with magic and common sense. It's the story of Ophelia and George, two Black Americans, and how they fall in love while trying to reconcile their differences of upbringing and culture. It's about the dying culture of Gullah on the Georgia sea islands.

Told from multiple perspectives, Mama Day is equal parts star-crossed love story, generational saga, and exploration of the supernatural. It is the kind of book that stays with you long after the final page.

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