The Island of Forgetting
SynopsisPlot
Barbados, 1962. Lost soul Iapetus roams the island, scared and alone, driven mad after witnessing his father’s death at the hands of his mother and his older brother, Cronus. Just before Iapetus is lost forever, he has a son, but the baby is not enough to save him from himself—or his family’s secrets. Seventeen years later, Iapetus’s son, the stoic Atlas, lives in a loveless house, under the care of his uncle, Cronus, and in the shadow of his charismatic cousin Z. Knowing little about the tragic circumstances of his father’s life, Atlas must choose between his desire to flee the island and his loyalty to the uncle who raised him.
Story
About this book
The Island of Forgetting is a novel by Jasmine Sealy that opens in Barbados in 1962. Iapetus wanders the island alone, his mind broken after he saw his father killed by his mother and his older brother, Cronus. Before he is lost completely, Iapetus becomes a father himself, though the child cannot hold him back from what his family has hidden.
Seventeen years later, his son Atlas is growing up in the household of his uncle Cronus, knowing little about how his father's life ended. Atlas is reserved, while his cousin Z draws attention easily, and the house gives shelter without affection. The central tension is a choice: leave the island for a different life, or stay loyal to the uncle who raised him.
The names come loosely from Greek mythology, since Atlas, Cronus and Iapetus were Titans in those old stories, reset here inside one Barbadian family across generations. Sealy uses that frame to follow how deep love, sometimes tragic, and secrets kept from the young are passed from one generation to the next on a small island.
