'A landmark, not in the West Indian, but in the contemporary novel.' C. L. R. James 'First-class talent.' The Voice Calvary Hill - poverty stricken, pot-holed and rubbish-strewn - is home to an ignored community who get to flaunt their personas in masquerade during the yearly town Carnival. Aldrick, the dashing "king of the hill" lives for Carnival and his chance to play the powerful dragon. But as his friends and neighbours strive for a better life, for Aldrick it will take one more masquerade - this time involving guns and hostages - for the illusion of power to become reality.

In Trinidad, in the wake of 1970's Black Power rebellion, we follow Sonnyboy, Singer King Kala, and their town's folk through experiments in music, politics, religion, and love and in their day-to-day adventures. Humorous and serious, sad and uplifting, Is Just a Movie, is a radiant novel about small moments of magic in ordinary life. Earl Lovelace's books include While Gods Are Falling, winner of the BP Independence Award; the Caribbean classic The Dragon Can't Dance; and Salt, which won the 1997 Commonwealth Writers Prize. For Is Just a Movie, he has won the Grand Prize for Caribbean Literature by the Regional Council of Guadeloupe and the 2012 OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature.

The second novel by an award-winning Caribbean novelist, playwright and poet. It deals with the impingements of modern life on a remote village in the interior of Trinidad which wants a school and a schoolmaster.

Exposing the political and cultural failure to address the challenges of postcolonial Trinidad, this insightful novel portrays a world where the working man must face the crime and violence that is destroying the social body. Walter Castle is dissatisfied with his regular job in the Laventille slum in Port of Spain. As the prospect of promotion is bleak and crime and lawless youth become insupportable, he dreams of going back to the village community he grew up in. Unfortunately, the force of nostalgia is not supported by actual memories and as Walter abandons his dreams he is forced to choose between turning into a drone who passes through life without leaving a mark, or standing up for himself. Originally published in 1965, this story remains surprisingly contemporary with its astringent critique of the top-down authoritarianism of nationalist politics.

After 19 years of teaching his pupils to emigrate, Alford George, elitist schoolteacher turned populist politician, is forced to work out a welcome for the diverse races of Trinidad to their own island and how to liberate those who, despite emancipation, are still struggling under old captivities.

In the town of Cascadu, Trinidad, the 1970 Black Power rebellion has failed. Sonnyboy, hapless and luckless, is desperate to be recognised as part of the rebellion and forces the uninterested police to arrest him. KingKala, a singer, returns from detention and is sidelined in the calypso tent, his music dated and unfashionable. They now hope to make their name in the movie that is being shot on the island - but that too does not end as expected. And so we follow the townsfolk through their experiments in music, politics, religion and love; as, in their day-to-day adventures - be it a game of cricket, the short life of a corner shop or a miracle at a funeral - they begin to see more clearly what their community has to offer for its liberation. Sad and uplifting, humorous but never mocking, Is Just a Movie is a warm, gentle novel about small moments of magic in ordinary life.