By Gabriel J. Christian
In his vibrant stories Christian captures the complex realities of a people whose long histories have been aching to be told, embellished with his own recollections and flair. Rain on a Tin Roof’s adventure-starved little boy, who dashes to a window to watch a hurricane swipe the galvanized-iron roofs off the island’s houses, is Christian.
The hormonal adolescent who five-finger-discounts his mother’s kitchen rum to set the mood for a day of carnival, hoping to “wriggle on his classmate Tessa’s behind,” is Christian. And Christian is also the protective brother who gives the evil eye to a crowd of jeering kids hurling stones and insults at his developmentally challenged sister.
Christian is eager to focus his attention on his home–and not to contribute to the brain drain that seems to plague most Caribbean countries, where children leave for education abroad but never return, physically or otherwise, to strengthen the islands that nurtured them.
