Author(s): Shauna Barbosa

Open Book Award

"These words feel like experiences. Some are personal, most are enlightening, but all connect. Connect on a higher Level. A spiritual level."
--Kendrick Lamar, Grammy Award-winning artist, and winner of the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Music

-- A Lit Hub Favorite Book of 2018

The speaker in Cape Verdean Blues is an oracle walking down the street. Shauna Barbosa interrogates encounters and the weight of their space. Grounded in bodily experience and the phenomenology of femininity, this collection provides a sense of Cape Verdean identity. It uniquely captures the essence of "Sodade," as it refers to the Cape Verdean American experience, and also the nostalgia and self-reflection one navigates through relationships lived, lost, and imagined. And its layers of unusual imagery and sound hold the reader in their grip.