Azucar! The Story of Sugar
by Alan Cambeira
Category: Dominican Republic

AZUCAR! The Story of Sugar is a fictional novel that offers a gripping testimony to the unmasked brutality and decay of daily life on a contemporary Caribbean sugarcane plantation, Esperanza Dulce. Azucar, the intelligent and beautiful young girl, is the central character, but the omnipresent protagonist is her namesake, "azucar" -- sugar itself. Azucar?s story is a complex and hauntingly atmospheric tale of sustained intrigue, murder, revenge, forbidden love, and an unnerving journey into the mystical spirit world of Caribbean ritual. Even after Azucar?s fiercely determined grandmother arranges for her to emigrate to Canada -- with a most unlikely couple-- where she is dramatically transformed, she is still not completely free from the hypnotic pull of the distant Caribbean plantation. Azucar meets and falls in love with Lucien, whose own mysterious history shockingly brings them both back to Esperanza Dulce to confront the terrifying ghosts of an unknowingly shared past.