'Is home the place where we are born? Or is it the place where we die?' These questions haunt Magnolia, a successful Haitian American real estate agent in Miami, after she hears the terrifying sounds of gunfire while shopping for her daughter's birthday gift. Once she's safely home, Magnolia hides the fact that she was at the mall shooting from everyone close to her. But given her life back, she begins to see it all clearly, and as if for the first time - the extraordinary bond she has with her teenage daughter, Zoë; the nearly broken relationship she has with her partner, Harrison; the ghost-haunted mind of her mentally unwell mother; her father's immense pain and his reason for seeking solace in the arms of a mistress. As Magnolia struggles through the labyrinth of her past, she must also come to terms with the losses sustained that traumatic day. Taking as its title the Haitian Kreyòl word for mourning, Dèy celebrates the complexity of life in a brave and striking novel that is one of Danticat's most powerful and deeply affecting works yet.
