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The author of the critically acclaimed historical fiction novel: “What A Mother’s Love Don’t Teach You”, Sharma Taylor remains an inspiration to emerging writers in the Caribbean
Sharma is an award-winning and critically acclaimed Jamaican writer. She is also a lawyer. Sharma won the 2020 Wasafiri Queen Mary New Writing Prize, the 2020 Frank Collymore Literary Endowment Award and the 2019 Bocas Lit Fest’s Johnson and Amoy Achong Caribbean Writers Prize. She was four times shortlisted for the Commonwealth Short Story Prize (2018, 2020, 2021 and 2022) and was a finalist for the 2020 Elizabeth Nunez Award for Writers in the Caribbean in the Brooklyn Caribbean Literary Festival’s (BCLF) Caribbean Fiction Writers Competition. She gained Second Prize in the 2020 First Novel Competition (organised by Daniel Goldsmith Associates Ltd, UK). Sharma has won gold medals in Barbados’ National Independence Festival of Creative Arts Literary Competition and the Best Adult Short Story Writer prize in the 2019 Jamaica Cultural Development Commission’s Creative Writing Competition.
Her longlists include: the Mairtín Crawford Award for Short Story 2020 (part of the Belfast Book Festival in Northern Ireland, administered by The Crescent), Sunspot Lit’s 2020 Inception contest for best opening to a short story, Mslexia Magazine’s 2019 Women's Flash Fiction Competition; and honorary mentions and longlisting in Fish Publishing’s 2021 Flash Fiction and Short Story Prizes.
Her short stories appear in the Arts Etc NIFCA Winning Words Anthologies- 2019/2020, 2017/2018 and 2015/2016; Poui: Cave Hill Journal of Creative Writing, The Caribbean Writer, Jamaica Journal, Commonwealth Writers’ Adda Stories, BIM: Arts for the 21st Century, Pree and the 2021 Fish Anthology. Her story for Pree “Saffy’s Song” was shortlisted in the Rebel Women Lit’s inaugural Caribbean Readers’ Awards 2020 which recognises outstanding works of Caribbean Literature.
She has been a featured reader at Bocas Lit Fest in Trinidad & Tobago (2019), the Talking Trees Literary Festival in Treasure Beach, Jamaica (2019) and at the 39th West Indian Literature Conference, UWI Cave Hill (2021). She has done various writing courses, including those offered by the University of the West Indies (Mona and Cavehill campuses), Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity (Alberta, Canada), Arvon, Bocas Lit Fest, BIM Literary Festival, Commonwealth Writers, National Cultural Foundation (Barbados). Sharma has been taught by eminent Caribbean writers including: Wayne Brown, Jane Bryce, Dr. Erna Brodber, Ingrid Persaud, Karen Lord, Monique Roffey, Kei Miller and Jacob Ross. She has a PhD from Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand. She is also a fiction writing coach.
Her debut novel ‘WHAT A MOTHER’S LOVE DON’T TEACH YOU’ is published by Virago in the UK and Commonwealth. Tweet @IAmSharmaTaylor and email: sharmataylorwrites@gmail.com
Featured in podcasts:
BBC World Service Cultural Frontline (August 6, 2022):
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w3ct37rr
Unstoppable Yes You: https://www.unstoppableyesyou.com/podcast-caribbean-conversations/episode/cab29f1b/lawyer-pursues-childhood-passion-for-writing
Brooklyn Caribbean Literary Festival Cocoa Pod:
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/bclf-cocoa-pod/id1598720414?i=1000575014542
Commonwealth Writers:
https://www.commonwealthwriters.org/sharma-taylor-in-conversation-with-alexia-tolas/
National Television:
CVM at Sunrise program (Jamaica) August 9, 2022 at the 1:31 minute mark
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJorjo5Lyk0
Book clubs
Page Turners Plus interview:
https://www.thebookseller.com/rights/virago-bags-sharma-taylors-deeply-moving-debut-1239371
- Judges of the First Novel Prize organized by Daniel Goldsmith Associates Ltd for unpublished manuscripts:
“A virtuoso command of voice and a stunningly atmospheric depiction of 1980s Jamaica combine to make this an exceptionally compelling and exciting first novel.” Chris White, Senior Commissioning Editor at Scribner/Simon & Schuster UK and Prize Co-judge
“This novel has such heart; I loved its exploration of the trauma of giving up a child, its polyphonic descriptions of Kingston, and the tricky moral positions it puts its characters in. The Jamaican vernacular voices stand out as a dazzling show of style and control.”
Eve White, Literary Agent at Eve White Literary Agency and Prize Co-judge
https://www.firstnovel.co.uk/first-novel-prize-2020-winners/
- Judges of the Wasafiri Queen Mary New Writing Prize:
“Framed as a recipe, this story’s beguilingly playful opening sets the scene for a compassionate, nuanced portrait of family life. ‘With enormous vigour and zest and skill it introduces you to a voice, to a setting, to a family, and it does it absolutely beautifully’ said fiction judge and Penguin editor Simon Prosser. ‘This story just totally leapt at me and gripped me from the first moment.’”
https://www.wasafiri.org/article/2020-queen-mary-wasafiri-new-writing-prize-winners-announced/
- Judges of the Bocas Lit Fest Johnson and Amoy Achong Caribbean Writers Prize:
“The top submissions displayed compelling narrative voices, measured pacing, arresting characterization and bold linguistic experiments…Sharma Taylor from Jamaica enters into the fragmenting mind of a domestic who had to give up her black child to a white couple in an informal adoption. On the 18th birthday anniversary of her child, she begins to see her son in boys of his age around her. The weight of her personal history and the burden of caring for a mother who has no recollection of history combine to push her toward the edge of the precipice.”
Funso Aiyejina, Chief Judge, speaking at the award announcement ceremony:
https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?v=889521704746736&ref=watch_permalink
and quoted in the Trinidad Express Newspaper May 10, 2019
- Judges of the 2019 Frank Collymore Literary Endowment Award:
“Sharma’s short stories are driven by compelling and vivid characters who are trying to reclaim things they have lost or to fill the emptiness inside. They may be broken familial ties, failed romantic relationships or missed opportunities. Her characters grapple convincingly with loss and try to navigate the struggles of daily life, attempting to fulfill their most cherished desires. This outstanding collection, written predominantly in Jamaican dialect, offers novel storytelling angles, is easy to read, and was found to be, in the words of one judge, “unputdownable.” “
http://www.artsetcbarbados.com/news/sharma-taylor-2019-frank-collymore-literary-award-winner quoting the Judges’ Citations
What’s my book ‘What A Mother’s Love Don’t Teach You’ about?
At eighteen years old, Jamaican helper Dinah gave away her newborn baby son to the rich couple she worked for before they left Jamaica. They never returned. She never forgot him. Eighteen years later, in the mid-1980s, a young man, Apollo, comes from the US to Kingston. From the moment she sees him, Dinah never doubts – this is her son. The events that unfold cause everyone to question what they know and where they belong.
A story of belonging, identity and inheritance, the book draws together a vivid host of voices to evoke Jamaica’s ghetto, dance halls, criminal underworld and corrupt politics, at the beating heart of which is a mother’s unshakeable love for her son. The novel is told from multiple points of view, in a mix of Jamaican patois and Standard English.
Here’s how fellow Jamaican writers describe the novel:
- ‘Sharma Taylor's What a Mother's Love Don't Teach You explores essential aspects of Jamaica's Social Psychological Environment which Marlon James's A Brief History of Seven Killings leaves unpainted. In short, these two works could usefully be read together. May Sharma's work meet the kind of success that Marlon's work has.’ ― Erna Brodber, author of Nothing's Mat
- ‘An astonishing book. In riveting, irresistible prose, Sharma Taylor's genre-crossing novel (a love story, a crime story, a yard fiction) tells a tale of Jamaica and America, of class, colour, race, history and the dignity of the dispossessed. The authenticity of its detail produces a searing truth that convicts us. The largeness of its vision challenges our ideas of what it means to be human.’ ― Curdella Forbes, author of A Tall History of Sugar
- ‘Truth-telling! Taylor's debut is tender, violent and uncompromising in turns. A vivid and authentic Jamaica that tells a tale too often hidden, for fantasies of sun, sea and sand.’― Leone Ross, author of ‘This One Sky Day'
- ‘Sharma Taylor's accomplished debut novel transports the reader from the rarefied air of Kingston's Jacks Hill to the gritty reality of inner city Lazarus Gardens. Told by an unforgettable cast of characters, each speaking searing truths of their own Jamaica, these compelling voices will linger long after the last page. What a Mother's Love Don't Teach You is a fine achievement.’ ― Diana McCaulay, author of Daylight Come
- ‘Taylor portrays a complex web of Jamaican characters in settings ranging from tenement yards to mansions with an authenticity that radiates throughout the novel. Set in an important time in the island's history, it's a colourful portrayal of a young man searching for his soul, the two mothers desperate to claim him, and the ultimate sacrifice one has to make. A wonderful debut novel.’ ― Gillian Royes. author of the Shad series
- ‘Echoes the dilemma of having to give up home and family to find hope elsewhere. Precious things wagered in pursuit of better might never be regained. Taylor's intimate portrayals of this dissonance is communicated through authentic voices full of universal truth, love and forgiveness.’ ― Roland Watson-Grant, author of Sketcher
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