A note and bonus content from Ann Dávila Cardinal, author of The Storyteller’s Death, the July Big Library Read pick

Wow, I never thought anyone else would ever read the short paragraphs at the end of this post which were the prologue and epilogue that originally framed my novel now known as The Storyteller’s Death. They were deleted in the course of revision, and though I totally understood and agreed with why, I thought that given the renewed interest in the novel via the global book club Big Library Read, I would pull them out again, and share them with you.

The novel was originally titled The Storyteller’s Gift, but as I revised it over many years, I decided it was more about grief. Yes, it’s about stories and family and my love for that powerful island of enchantment, but it is mainly about death... and what remains. What we leave behind to carry on. And for me? That will always be stories. For me, this novel is about the death of a storyteller, just not the one you think.

The prologue was based on my real-life experience of visiting the property my great aunt and uncle owned in Bayamón about ten years back. Puerto Rico is undergoing massive change and over-development, it is being robbed of its culture, and its people are being forced out. Bad Bunny, bless his brilliant heart, dedicated his most recent album, DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS, to this issue.

The brief epilogue gives you a glimpse into the context in which I saw Isla’s story, and how, with the passing on of the gift, her tale could continue with subsequent generations.

So, I’m offering this bonus content only to you, dear Libby Big Library Read readers, as a thank you for taking part in BLR. Thank you again to OverDrive, Libby, Sourcebooks, and all the amazing librarians and readers out there. I’m honored to have been part of this incredible program.

I hope you enjoy it. If not, don’t @ me. ;)

Prologue

I wrap my fingers around the bars of the chest high iron fence that surrounds the church parking lot. The white paint is flaking, and the metal is hot as a skillet under the midday Puerto Rican sun, but I need to hold on in order to ground myself in the present. I probably shouldn’t have come. I’ve managed to avoid it for a very long time. It was easy since there hasn’t been any reason to come to Bayamón for years. My family has all migrated to Guaynabo or San Juan, and my condo is an hour away in Luquillo. But something called me here today. Or someone.

In the corners of the lot I can see tall tufts of greenery valiantly trying to hold their diminished ground, patches of wildness left over from my great aunt Alma’s jungle. If the GPS hadn’t told me this was it, this exact spot, I wouldn’t have recognized it. My uncle Ramón’s house was on the right; the other boundary of the lot runs right through what was his sitting room. I imagine him in his wicker rocking chair, a fence between him and his wife Lourdes.

I look to the left. That’s where Alma’s house was. It would have butted up next to the church. My pious tía would have liked that, a church on her property. But of course, it wasn’t her property anymore. The house is gone, the thick jungle of banana trees and flor de maga bushes and the red ginger flowers that surrounded it now covered over with asphalt and divided into faded rectangular parking spaces. The smell of jasmine and ripe mangoes replaced by belches of diesel and hot pavement. I swallow hard, pushing a wave of emotions down into my belly.

This is where it started. This is where I found out about my gift.

I turn around with a lurch, and head back to my car across the street. I can’t look at it anymore. It’s not that my memories of the property are bad, but just that I’d rather remember it as it was back then. My cousin Maria didn’t understand why I wanted to come here. “There’s nothing there, Prima! It’s just going to depress you.” Seems she was right. She always was smarter than me, at least according to our grandmother.

As I drive through Bayamón, I realize it’s not just my family’s property that changed, but the entire town. The ice cream shop is a tire store, the old school farmacia a boxy Ikea, and on my family’s former farmland, a Costco squats in all its massive warehouse glory. I chastise myself because I certainly didn’t expect that it would stay unchanged, encased in a bubble of reminiscence, so why does it still make me sad?

I think about the Bayamón summers of my childhood on the drive home, the Sunday traffic light through San Juan, thinning even more on Sixty-Six east. This highway wasn’t here back then. You had to take the slow route three through towns and streetlights, the trip to El Yunque and Fajardo far more languid than it is today.

After dinner, I open the sliding glass doors to the balcony and decide to sleep right there in the hammock so I can hear the sound of the ocean and rock to sleep cradled in the woven cotton netting. But it’s not the sound of the surf I hear as I fall asleep, but rather the rustle of gardenia bushes and the night song of coquis, the tree frogs that frequented the bushes below the windows of Alma’s house. The sizzle of frying plantain from Lourdes’s open kitchen window, and the waves of salsa music that ride the breeze from cars that pass by in no hurry to get where they’re going. But behind all those sounds, I hear the stories. Always the stories.

Epilogue

The boy stands frozen where the dusty trail splits, his friend already disappeared around the next rise on the way to the summit. He had seen them: two people. They were right there, coming down on the other route, but they’d just…disappeared. Thing is, it wasn’t just the people he had seen; they had been surrounded by a lush, jungle-like trail instead of the dry Utah brush on either side.

“Carlos!” his roommate Sonny had started back down around the trail’s dogleg when he realized Carlos wasn’t behind him. “C’mon, daylight’s burning!”

He doesn’t say anything for a moment, just keeps staring at the space where he saw the couple walking, hand-in-hand.

Sonny comes up to him and waves his hands in front of his face. “Hello? Anyone in there?”

He probably shouldn’t admit it, should just keep it to himself, but he blurts out, “Dude, I…I think I just saw my grandmother.”

Sonny flashed his one-sided grin. “Um, I don’t think your grandma could hike this trail, man.”

He scoffs. “You don’t know my grandmother.” He pictures her face. “But it was her when she was young, anyway, like in my mom’s old photo albums. She was with some guy.”

Sonny squints at him, still smiling but looking wary. “Did you do some peyote buttons and not tell me?”

Carlos shakes his head. “No. I swear, she was right there.” He points up the other branch of the trail. “But…she’s in Puerto Rico.” That was it! He thought he’d recognized the setting. It was El Yunque. He and his sister had done that hike a dozen times with their parents and grandmother.

Sonny shakes his head and gives a dismissive wave. “Whatever, man. We gonna finish this hike, or what?” He resumes heading up the trail but looks back impatiently.

“Sure. Yeah.” He starts walking and catches up with Sonny, but his mind is still on what he’d seen.

Sonny stops, and puts his hand on Carlos’ chest, halting him. “Seriously, you okay? We can bag this if you want, go back to the dorms and watch Netflix.”

“Nah, I’m good. Let’s do this.” And as they press on, Carlos decides he will call his grandmother as soon as they get back into cell range. He would be worried about her, but she looked so…happy.

✨ To learn more about the author, visit anndavilacardinal.com.

RELATED READ: This haunting tale of family, secrets & storytelling is the next Big Library Read pick