Beka Lamb, by Zee Edgell

Beka Lamb
by Zee Edgell

This luminous novel brings to life a unique time and place—Belize in the 1950s, at the beginning of its struggle for independence from Great Britain—through the eyes of a girl at the edge of womanhood.

Fourteen-year-old Beka determines to spend a day in remembrance of her best friend, Toycie, whose death has not been marked by the traditional nine-day wake. We follow Beka on her journey of memory, which includes universal human dramas—love, loss, the power of sexuality—as well as vividly observed details of Belize and its fascinating mosaic of cultures, races, languages, and ethnicities.

Edgell offers the reader a window onto the rise of the Belizean independence movement, but the political issues never overwhelm the human scale of the book. Instead, we see the impact of the struggle on friendships and family relationships, and the ways in which larger social issues reflect personal conflicts and challenges. Family squabbles and national unrest are seen almost as elements of the same impulse toward growth, and all of these threads come together beautifully in Beka’s tapestry of recollection.

What makes this book so special to me is Edgell’s astonishing gift for language. Her sentences flow like music, or like a familiar bedtime story, soothing and hypnotic. Yet the power of her descriptions fills the reader’s mind with lasting pictures of a rich, colorful world.

This power is present in the book’s memorable, dreamlike opening:

On a warm November day Beka Lamb won an essay contest at St. Cecilia’s Academy, situated not far from the front gate of His Majesty’s Prison on Milpa Lane. It seemed to her family that overnight Beka changed from what her mother called a “flat-rate Belize Creole” into a person with “high mind”.

This passage shows another of Edgell’s strengths—her ability to infuse the rhythms of Belizean Creole into standard English prose in what seems like a perfectly natural way. To me, this is one of the most incredible achievements of the book; the dialogue is unforgettable.

No wake had been held for Toycie, not even one night’s worth. Miss Eila had explained to Gran that times were too hard to hold a proper nine nights for Toycie, especially as Miss Eila didn’t belong to a lodge or a syndicate. Miss Ivy offered to pay for the food, but Miss Eila’s refusal had been strong.

“Toycie would not have want me to put misself in Poor House over wake, thank you all the same, Miss Ivy,” she’d said.

Beka Lamb far surpasses more famous novels like To Kill A Mockingbird in successfully capturing complex social issues through the eyes of a young girl. A truly incredible book, it should be far more widely read than it is.

Other novels by Zee Edgell:

In Times Like These
Edgell’s second novel deals with the final stages of the Belizean struggle for independence in the 1980s, framed by the story of a widely traveled woman who returns to her native Belize to confront family conflicts, personal challenges, and social change.

The Festival of San Joaquin
Despite its highly charged plot—a woman who has been legally exonerated of the death of her abusive husband must face the condemnation of friends and family—this novel by Edgell is most memorable for the power of its observation and characterization. Belize’s mestizo community takes center stage in this powerful story.