Jamaican Author Jean Goulbourne talks Culture, Values and New Book JANICE

A courageous and moving story of a teenager’s loyalty

JaniceBook: Janice

Author: Jean Goulbourne

Publication: 29 July 2014
ISBN: 978-1-908446-21-3
Price: £3.99

Format: E-book
Category: Young Adult

Schoolgirl Janice, in the care of her single mother, with a father in prison, leaves the poverty and crime of the ghetto for a life with more prospects when her mother gets a job in the suburbs. But all is not what it seems, the affluent household she moves to has its own problems, and secrets, and soon Janice is caught up in a dark web of suspicion as the well-off girls at her new school look down on her and her ghetto past. Caught between two worlds, Janice begins to wonder if the grass is really greener on the other side of the tracks. Are these new upwardly-mobile city dwellers any better than the poor people at the standpipe in her old home, or the rural life of her grand-parents in the country?

“Jean Coulbourne’s novel for young adults, JANICE, is a moving moral tale for our times. Old-fashioned values and a desire to better herself is at the heart of this new novel which is a well-timed and accessible read.” – Maggie Harris, winner, Commonwealth Short Story Prize (Caribbean Region)

Author Jean Goulbourne is a poet and novelist. She lives in Cross Keys, Manchester, Jamaica. She read History at the University of the West Indies, Mona, gained a Masters in Education and was a recipient of a James Michener Fellowship.

DUNIA Magazine had a chance to interview Ms Goulbourne about her book Janice and more…

Jean Goulbourne

In your opinion, what are some key differences between Jamaicans and other nationalities?

Some say there are two Jamaicas the rich and the marginalized. We can identify it in our speech, in our living conditions, in the quality of our homes. In between there are several races and variations in colour. Our values are different depending on our backgrounds.

In the inner city, a girl is condemned for not having a child before she is twenty years old. In the upper and middle classes, girls are encouraged to be educated. Yet at the same time there are more girls in the tertiary institutions than boys.

We are a complex society forever changing as the education system reaches more poor children and many are pulling themselves out of poverty. Janice belongs to the poor classes and as a girl from the inner city, she has had to make the choice to better herself. AS in so many households, Janice spends most of her life without a father figure. This is one of the reasons for the break down in family life in Jamaica.

Your book Janice is about choices that Janice the lead character is forced to make, how has the world changed in terms of values from your childhood days to now?

During my childhood, I was sheltered having been born to parents who were teachers, my father was headmaster of various schools and my mother taught too. I had a caring loving family around me and an extended family that cared. Because of this I was more or less unaware of what was taking place around me here in the countryside.

I remember that there were more weddings and the nuclear family was more evident. Some teenagers got pregnant and were frowned upon in fact they were considered to be finished- no more schooling and some were put out of church for a while. Now many girls choose to have children just after leaving school and they are able to move on into tertiary institutions and better themselves. There is practically no more stigma to having a child out of wedlock as even teachers are having children out of wedlock something unheard of in my childhood. Such a teacher would have lost her job.

There are more opportunities and people are more materialistic than before.

What can readers expect from your book?

In the book Janice, I am trying to show some aspects of Jamaica, the inner city, the upper middle class neighbourhood and rural Jamaica all of which I have experienced having lived with my paternal grandmother in a inner city area while going to school in Kingston, having lived with an aunt in middle class area in Kingston , having lived in the countryside and also having spent time with my maternal grandmother in St Elizabeth. I want to show the possibility of upward mobility in spite of challenges, the importance of hard work and realization of one’s ambitions. I want also to show that there is love everywhere, not just in wealthier neighbourhoods and that money is not everything and does not buy happiness.

Janice is available on Amazon

HopeRoad publishes multicultural literature and with a focus on exciting writings from and about Africa, Asia and the Caribbean. Website: www.hoperoadpublishing.com

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