The Last Warner Woman

"Miller is a name to watch."—The Independent

"This is magical, lyrical, spellbinding writing."—Granta

Adamine Bustamante is born in one of Jamaica's last leper colonies. When Adamine grows up, she discovers she has the gift of "warning": the power to protect, inspire, and terrify. But when she is sent to live in England, her prophecies of impending disaster are met with a different kind of fear—people think she is insane and lock her away in a mental hospital.

Now an older woman, the spirited Adamine wants to tell her story. But she must wrestle for the truth with the mysterious "Mr. Writer Man," who has a tale of his own to share, one that will cast Adamine's life in an entirely new light. In a story about magic and migration, stories and storytelling, and the New and Old Worlds, we discover it is never one person who owns a story or has the right to tell it.

Born in Kingston, Jamaica, in 1978, Kei Miller is the author of The Same Earth, winner of the Una Marson Prize for Literature; and Fear of Stones, which was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best First Book. His most recent poetry collection has been shortlisted for the Jonathan Llewellyn Rhys Prize, the Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, and the Scottish Book of the Year Award. In 2008 he was an International Writing Fellow at the University of Iowa. Miller currently divides his time between Jamaica and Scotland.