When the Mapou Sings

Summary

Infused with magical realism, this story blends first love and political intrigue with a quest for justice andself-determination in 1930s Haiti.Sixteen-year-old Lucille hopes to one day open a school alongside her bestfriend where girls just like them can learn what it means to be Haitian: to learn from the mountains and theforests around them, to carve, to sew, to draw, and to sing the songs of the Mapou, the sacred trees that dot theisland nation. But when her friend vanishes without a trace, a dream—a gift from the Mapou—tells Lucille togo to her village’s section chief, the local face of law, order, and corruption, which puts her life and her family’sat risk. Forced to flee her home, Lucille takes a servant post with a wealthy Haitian woman from society’selite in Port-au-Prince. Despite a warning to avoid him, she falls in love with her employer’s son. But whentheir relationship is found out, she must leave again—this time banished to another city to work for a visitingAmerican writer and academic conducting fieldwork in Haiti. While Lucille’s new employer studies vodou andworks on the novel that will become Their Eyes Were Watching God, Lucille risks losing everything she caresabout—and any chance of seeing her best friend again—as she fights to save their lives and secure her futurein this novel in verse with the racing heart of a thriller.