Unburnable is a 2006 novel written byAntiguan authorMarie-Elena John and published byHarperCollins/Amistad. It is John'sdebut novel. Parthistorical fiction,murder mystery, andneo-slave narrative,Unburnable is a multi-generational saga that follows theAfrican Diaspora in the United States and theCaribbean, offering a reinterpretation ofblack history. John was an Africa Development specialist inNew York City andWashington, D.C., prior to turning to writing. Since publication of Unburnable, she has worked with the United Nations, currently serving as Senior Racial Justice Lead at UN Women.
The narrative of family, betrayal, vengeance, and murder follows a fictional character named Lillian Baptiste as she is willed back to her island home ofDominica fromWashington, D.C., to finally settle her past. Haunted by scandal and secrets, Baptiste had fled Dominica when she was fourteen after discovering she was the daughter of Iris, the half-crazy woman whose life was told of inchanté mas songs sung duringCarnival: songs about a village on a mountaintop littered with secrets,masks that supposedly fly and wreak havoc, and a man who suddenly and mysteriously dropped dead. After twenty years away, Lillian returns to her island of birth to face the demons of her past.
Set in both contemporary Washington, D.C., and Dominica, and switching back and forth between contemporary and historical stories,Unburnable weaves together the black experience with Caribbean culture and history. Among the themes in the novel are theCaribs (the Kalinago), theMaroons, the history of Carnival andmasquerade, the practice ofObeah, the fusion ofAfrican religions andCatholicism, resistance toslavery andpost-colonial issues.
The novel has received favourable book reviews in the United States and the Caribbean.Essence Magazine's book editor, Patrick Bass, selectedUnburnable as one of three "Patrick's Pick's", commenting that "Unburnable marks the arrival of a major new voice in fiction."[1]InBlack Issues Book Review, Denise M. Doig called the novel's author "superb".[2] Dalia King ofThe Trinidad Guardian in her review of the novel commented, "John weaves the weighty issues of race, sex and politics into the fabric of a historical Dominica without allowing the essential story of 'Unburnable'—that of a woman searching for her past so that she may find herself—to get lost in the novel’s own self-importance".[3]
"Review collection".ChickenBones: A Journal for Literary & Artistic African-American Themes. Retrieved2007-03-14.