Bittersweet is a collage representing both a reconstructed homeland and Scarborough, Ontario. It considers memory using photographs, maps, language, and folklore. Bringing together definitions, recipes, cartography, photo albums, and oral stories, it meditates on themes of obscured and suppressed history, theft, time, and liminality. The poems journey from Toronto to Guyana to South Asia, and Scarborough remains omnipresent, with a mix of identities and a strong, active, and boisterous youthful presence. (From Mawenzi House Publishers)

Natasha Ramoutar is an Indo-Guyanese writer who lives in Scarborough, Ont. She used to be a producer for CBC Music and currently works at the Festival of Literary Diversity (FOLD). Bittersweet is her first book.