A father makes the fateful decision to leave a successful career in the US behind and move to an isolated beach in the Dominican Republic. He plants ten thousand coconut seedlings, transplants his wife and two young daughters to a small village, and declares they are the luckiest people alive. In reality, the family is in the path of hurricanes and in the grip of a brutal dictator, Rafael Trujillo-and the children are additionally under the thumb of an increasingly volatile and alcoholic father. Set against a backdrop of shimmering palms and kaleidoscope sunsets, The Coconut Latitudes is Rita Gardner's compelling memoir of a childhood in paradise, a journey into unexpected misery, and a twisted path to redemption and truth.
Gold Medal Winner, Autobiography/Memoir, 2015 IBPA Benjamin Franklin Awards. Rita is an infant when her father leaves a successful career in the US to live in "paradise"--a seaside village in the Dominican Republic. The Coconut Latitudes is her haunting, lyrical memoir of surviving a reality far from the envisioned Eden--and of the terrible cost of keeping secrets.