"The Lesson" or how to humanize the Caribbean in science fiction

I read “The Lesson” by Cadwell Turnbull around the end of summer 2019 all thanks to @bookofcinz enthusiastic recommandation. And I was definitely as enthusiastic as her when I finished reading this novel.

Here’s my pitch : An alien spaceship lands in the US Virgin Islands. What would you do if you were to live among strong and short-tempered space alien people for several years? Would you be as wary as ordinary teenage girl Patrice? Or would you be as fascinated as her first love and childhood best friend Derrick who wants to find out every little thing about these aliens?

It took me a few months and another read to finally verbalize all the feelings that I felt with this book. To me, the story was more than just a colonization-themed story. To me, it was a contemporary representation of the Caribbean, the kind of contemporary representation that I crave for.

A Caribbean lifestyle

The first part of the novel is to introduce the different characters in a “slice-of-life” style. Derrick and Patrice coming home from school, Derrick’s grandmother asking him to wash the dishes, Patrice trying to hold a discussion with Jackson, her father who is about to retire, Jackson and his wife Aubrey arguing… It’s all in the small details like the fact they have “house clothes”, the fact that they complain about the power or water cuts, the way they kiss their teeth instead of rolling their eyes, the fact that a getway weekend would mean going to another island, the fact that teenagers need to decide if going to college also means having to leave their island for a few years… The way Cadwell Turnbull describes places, sounds, smells is so vivid that the reader gets to experience an authentic Caribbean lifestyle.

Caribbean families

This Caribbean lifestyle also means we get to see different family models. Derrick and his little sister are raised by their grandmother. Patrice is the only child of Jackson and Aubrey, a couple with a 15-year age gap. Their relationship is about to implode when the overall story begins… The countdown before the alien spaceship landing allows us to explore the doubts and existential crisis the main characters are going through. The Ynaa people barging into their spaces and seemingly calm lives pushes them to take decisions and to reconsider their priorities. All through the novel, family units get created and get dissolved. Relationships are formed, relationships get disrupted, relationships get deeper. And that’s how each individual small action has repercussions on the overall community you get to discover in the second part of the story.

Vulnerabilities

It would be hard to tell you about the women in this book without giving too much away… So let’s say the women are the ones keeping the plot moving forward. Men are witnesses, observers who go with the flow because they have no other choice. I actually don’t think they would take matters into their own hands if they could? As I keep saying in my podcast Karukerament, Caribbean men in fictions are rarely seen in a positive light. Or they’re just Garystufied with a minor role that lacks realism. With Jackson and Derrick, “The Lesson” goes against the usual stereotype of Caribbean men having no feelings at all. They represent two types of generations, their dilemmas are different, their life paths are different, but they both feel like their life isn’t what it should be. They both long to find what’s missing in their lives without hurting the people they love. So, it isn’t about showing them as perfect people always in control. It’s about following their journey to discover what is right for them and how to adjust what they want to what other people want. They sometimes feel loneliness, but solitude lets them express their vulnerability. In this story, men’s internal turmoil gets to be seen, it gets to be verbalized. That’s why I was surprised to read reviews that would complain about the lack of character development caused by a narration “all over the place” and the lack of description on the characters’ feelings… From my perspective, I was okay with the storytelling and I wouldn’t say there was a lack of character development. I would say these slices of life were just enough to tie the main plot together. There’s no ambiguity about what the women in this book feel. The discussions are short but direct and honest. The settings are clear enough to understand what the characters are going through. That’s actually what I enjoyed the most about the characters: their emotional sobriety. Even when their actions may look excessive, they weren’t over the top. This emotional sobriety might be the result of their ability to resilience, their ability to move forward even when tragedy hits them.

What about colonization?

I honestly don’t think the Ynaa are an allegory to represent just the European White colonizer. Technically, the Ynaa don’t officially intervene in the economy or in the government policies. They don’t even exploit the land nor the people… They might be here to eventually colonize Earth, but it hasn’t happened yet. Our speculations are based on actual historical events because “The Lesson” gives a detailed and precise contextualization of the history of the Caribbean. From the Native Caribbean people to the current power dynamics with the United States after 400 years of European colonization, this novel tells the history of violence and suffering. “The Lesson” shows how absolutely nothing can justify the colonization and the implement of the slavery system at an industrial level in the Caribbean.

“The Lesson” is Caribbean science fiction questioning the definition of humanity by looking back directly at the particular history of this region of the world.

N.B : you can read the original version in French.