Description

An internationally award-winning writer makes her triumphant American debut in this emotionally powerful family saga—a potent blend of Queenie and The Vanishing Half—about a woman’s journey to uncover a foundational family secret from the childhood she does not remember.

On the cusp of thirty, Ghanaian Londoner Whitney Appiah was born with a special gift. The massage therapist can physically sense where her clients’ trauma lies and heal them. But Whitney has no idea that she too, is suffering. Tragic events from her youth have left a terrible, unseen mark. When a dangerous encounter with the man she’s dating triggers a wave of fragmented recollections, Whitney embarks on a journey to reclaim her memories and the truth that is buried deep in her early years growing up in Kumasi, Ghana during the 1990s.

Spanning three decades and told through multiple viewpoints, this compelling dual timeline novel explores what happens when we try to move forward through the lacuna of our past.

A strikingly original work of Black British fiction inspired by the Twi proverb of Sankofa: looking back in order to move forward, The Rest of You is a story of generational healing, the bonds between sisters, and surviving familial migrant journeys. Tackling darkly serious themes yet full of hope and optimism, and told with an eye towards the future, Maame Blue’s extraordinary tale is an unforgettable celebration of womanhood, friendship, and family.

But to heal her own past, she must first remember it. What happens when the truth is more devastating than the forgetting?