A coming-of-age tale with a twist: a clinically depressed Trinidadian teenager, who has attempted suicide, is banished by her mother to Canada to live with her aunt. She feels lonely and in exile. But with the help of her lesbian aunt, a gorgeous-looking boy and her Skyping best friend "back home" in Trinidad, she begins to realise that loving families can exist in different shapes and sizes. Then her mother arrives and threatens to take her back to Trinidad. Where then is home?

Alethea Lopez is about to turn 40. A fashionable, mixed-race boutique manager who lives and works in Trinidad's capital city, Port of Spain, she is feisty, fiercely independent and morally ambiguous. Her secrets show only in her bruised skin and the occasional glimpse into her shattered sense of self. When Alethea witnesses a woman murdered by her jealous lover, her eyes are opened to the lives of the women all around her: from her colleague Tamika, who is engaged to marry an unfaithful man, and her childhood best friend Jankie, the teenage bride of their PE teacher, to her own mother, Marcia, who allowed her daughter to be sexually abused in exchange for the family's financial and emotional stability. In first-person Creole, Alethea brings us her truth in an arresting, unsparing Trinidadian voice. As her story unfolds, we see her navigate a dangerous path between her abusive partner Leo, a failed musician who wants to own her body and soul, and the spineless boss she sleeps with only to preserve her personal power. But when she is reunited with her adopted brother, decades after they parted, memories and family secrets begin to unlock and she starts to understand the person she has become. Alethea's next step is to decide on the woman she wants to be.

Everybody's got that one dream You know..."C'mon lotto..". or "If I ever get rich and famous" kinda dream.Here's mine...I've always wanted to own this big ol' Victorian house, with the wrap around porch and the rotunda Inside would be practice rooms, a recording studio, and a great room that would have built in bookshelves filled with books on poets, and musicians, and music. In another large room would be a stage for poetry readings and acoustic nights and such.A non-profit creative arts school FREELANCE & FREEDOM PERFORMING ARTS The cost would be on a sliding scale for most and free to those who don't have the means to pursue their creative art in music. It would be an environment that would provide music lessons and/or explore creativity and dreams in music.I've wanted to do this ever since I saw the movie Billy Jack The character Jean ran a school where creativity was key to finding yourself and also a place providing a human service. That was when I first put creative arts providing a human service together I have worked in human service related jobs for over twenty years. I have been writing since childhood and loved music since birth. So in addition to "C'mon lotto.."."If I ever get rich and famous..".have you ever heard anyone say..."Someday I'm gonna write a book "Working a job where I could use my creativity was always my first choice, but, like so many other people I was pushed to get a "real job." So I pondered...and I thought...what if I write a book?It would give me personal satisfaction and pride...'real riches don't have dollar signs'...and if it did make a few bucks, I could donate 'money' to a human service cause Creative art providing a human service Livin' the dream...Now isn't that just poetic justice?