Wise Women Gather
5 Wise Women Gather: The Healing Circle
Wise Women Gather is based on the premise that women have gathered a wealth of wisdom from their experiences over time. This wisdom is in great demand by a society deeply wounded by atrocities from the hands of its inhabitants. Women are in a special position to exercise their wisdom on the path of healing these wounds. We are empowered, we are capable, and we are ready to take action in ways that contribute to the health of our world while fulfilling our own purpose in life.
In acknowledgment of our experiences and the gifts of wisdom and discernment, I created Wise Women Gather as a healing and celebration circle. It is positioned as a sacred passage of self discovery, personal growth, and spiritual awakening. Here, women enter a sanctuary to explore the inner world, develop and share intuitive abilities, heal old wounds, and connect with a community of like-hearted souls. In this circle, we unveil our true essence and affirm a life grounded in abundance, aligned with purpose, and carried by wisdom.
5 Wise Women Gather: The Podcast
Where Soul Meets Story & Wisdom Talks Boldly
This is a soulful, spirit-led space that honors the lived experiences and wisdom of women. Here, we gather for laughter, hard truths, reflective storytelling, and radiant healing.
Why five? I am often asked, “Who are the five? Am I one of them?” I chose this title because of its ancestral and spiritual resonance. Five is rhythmic—five senses, five directions, five fingers shaping life. I love the poetic energy of five. It feels ancestral and modern at once, like something whispered around a fire and streamed on Spotify.
Most important, five reflects my preoccupation with the seasons of life. Beyond spring, summer, autumn, and winter, I add a fifth—the season of storytelling and reflection, which is the season I explore in my book Rise and Shine: You Are the Best Thing That Ever Happened to You. The podcast grows directly from this book. The circle is the practice. The podcast is the voice. Rise and Shine is the foundation. Together, they embody the movement of women rising.
What We Share
Each month, women are invited into bold conversations that reach for joy, purpose, and resilience, while also holding space for grief, rage, and truth. Sometimes five voices rise in chorus; sometimes one voice speaks with power. Every time, wisdom flows through the circle like water. This is not just talk. This is testimony.
Upcoming Themes
1. Purpose – The journey to fulfilling your life’s goals and dreams
2. How to Practice Joy – Especially when the world feels heavy
3. Dressing Well – As ritual, resistance, and radiant self-love
4. Navigating Grief – Holding memory without letting it drown us
5. Love, Romance & Sex – For grown women who still burn bright
6. The Power of Resilience – How we survive, shift, and soar
7. Radiant Living – Creating a life that glows from the inside out
The Invitation
We’ve gathered before—around the fire of friendship, the altar of motherhood, the circle of memory. Though I paused to walk through grief, the circle never closed. Now we begin again, and you are invited.
Pull up a chair. Pour some wisdom. Pass the mic. Whether you come in stilettos, slippers, or sandals, this circle is for you.
Subscribe to Wise Women Gather for monthly reflections, affirmations, and behind-the-scenes stories drawn from the Soul Notes and Wisdom Flow of Rise and Shine.
Stories That Speak Across Generations
Each of Marva McClean’s books is a vessel carrying the memories, melodies, and medicine of her heritage.
My books are called forth by history through the whisperings of the ancestors. They are testaments of survival, resistance, and radiance. Each one is braided with truth-telling, memory-keeping, and liberation work through the lens of Black consciousness, womanhood, and diaspora wisdom. I have written across genres; books that teach, testify, and tremble the ground. Whether I’m unearthing Indigenous methodologies in academic spaces, reflecting on Caribbean ancestral wisdom, or whispering soul-stirring affirmations into the wind, I remain rooted in one truth: our stories are survival.
I founded Strong in the Broken Places as a digital sanctuary during the global pandemic; a place where voices from across the Diaspora gathered to resist, remember, and rise. And I continue to speak boldly through projects like Navigating Black Privilege, Rise and Shine, and my ongoing podcast and newsletter Wise Women Gather.
So, whether you come to me as a reader, student, sister, or seeker, you are welcome.
Bring your questions. Bring your rhythm. Bring your arising.
Explore My Work
Honoring Heritage! Celebrating Poetic Memory! Dedicated to Empowered Living!
My writing moves between worlds, grounded in academic rigor, alive with ancestral storytelling, infused with poetic memory, and dedicated to empowered living. From global conversations on justice and equity to intimate portraits of resilience, each work reflects my commitment to honoring heritage, deepening understanding, and shaping a more humane future.
• Academic rigor (Navigating Black Privilege, Indigenous Epistemology, Struggle for Justice)
• Ancestral storytelling (From the Middle Passage to Black Lives Matter)
• Poetic memory (Bridges to Memory)
• Empowered living (Rise and Shine)
• Education Justice (The Struggle for Justice, Peace and Equity in the Global Classroom)
• Ancestral Ways of Knowing Across Cultures (Indigenous Epistemology)
NAVIGATING DIASPORIC SPACES
Tracing my footsteps from community circles to international stages, where each encounter becomes a page in the story of the African Diaspora.
Here you’ll find glimpses of my journey — photographs capturing the spirit of local gatherings, the brilliance of conferences, and the shared humanity I meet across borders. Each image is a reminder that in researching myself, I am also researching my people.
Love Stories from the Heart of the Caribbean
A Romance Trilogy by Dr. Marva McClean
Welcome Me Back Home is a sensual, reflective romance trilogy exploring love, longing, and
belonging across the Caribbean and its diaspora. These are love stories written for readers who
understand that desire does not fade with time, it deepens with wisdom, and that returning home
is as much an inner journey as a geographic one.
Across three interconnected volumes, nine unforgettable women navigate love as memory, risk,
and reclamation. These stories invite us to consider love as a homecoming:
to the body,
to memory,
to the self we never truly left behind.
Set against the lush landscapes and emotional rhythms of Jamaica, the wider Caribbean, and
diasporic spaces beyond, this trilogy speaks to cultural longing and the quiet courage it takes to
open the heart again, sometimes after decades of restraint.
Read them one at a time. Devour them all at once. But once you step inside, don’t expect to leave
unchanged.
The Trilogy
Volume One: Welcome Me Back Home & Other Love Stories
Stories of return, reunion, and rekindled desire.
This opening volume explores what happens when women return—physically or
emotionally—to the places and loves that shaped them, and discover that the past still knows
their name.
1. Welcome Me Back Home
Tirza has built a life in Miami—marriage, home, and the appearance of contentment. But when
she returns to Jamaica for her high school reunion; the past rises to meet her in the form of
Stephen, her first crush. As old feelings resurface, Tirza must decide whether the life she built is
the life she truly wants.
2. Sing Me a Sweet Song on My Journey Home
Seven years after leaving Jamaica, Cherrie returns under the shadow of loss to bury her beloved
Aunt Lucy. In the quiet intimacy of a repast garden, memory and longing collide when she
encounters Tony, the older brother of her childhood friend—awakening a tenderness she thought
she had buried.
3. Geography of My Desire
She cannot name him aloud, yet he lives in every beat of her heart. In the stillness of night,
beside a husband she no longer reaches for, her mind drifts to the man whose touch she has never
fully known, but whose presence has quietly claimed her. This is a story of longing, restraint, and
the intimate maps of forbidden desire.
Volume Two: Are You Sure You Want to Dance With Me? & Other Love Stories
Stories of temptation, testing boundaries, and love that asks for your whole heart.
The second volume turns toward movement—dance floors, chance encounters, and moments
when attraction demands a response. These stories explore women standing at the edge of
decision, where desire asks not for permission, but for courage.
Volume Three: In Each Other’s Company & Other Love Stories
Stories of unexpected connection, personal awakening, and choosing joy.
The final volume offers stories of companionship, late-blooming love, and the quiet revolutions
that happen when women allow themselves to be fully seen. These are journeys into intimacy,
friendship, and the courage to step into a new life—together or alone.
Themes Throughout the Trilogy
● Romance and emotional wisdom
● Love as cultural memory
● Island love and diasporic longing
● Return, remembrance, and self-reclamation
● Women choosing desire without apology
Author Engagements
Dr. Marva McClean is available for:
• Author readings & literary conversations
• Book club visits (virtual or in-person)
• Libraries, bookstores, and cultural institutions
• Media and podcast interviews
The Caribbean is calling.
Let these stories welcome you back—not just to a place, but to yourself.
Rise and Shine Book Club
sassy, wise, and unapologetically radiant
Get the Book & Join the Movement
Archived Work
o Sound The Abeng: Writing Black, Aboriginal & Indigenous Lives
Sound the Abeng is dedicated to exploring the profound impacts of colonization and slavery on the lives of our extended communities while highlighting their resilience and cultural contributions to the world at large. Through short articles, prose, and poetry, we shed light on the intricate tapestry of experiences and accomplishments that shape our shared humanity. Our intention is to reach out, collaborate with, and celebrate the work of writers, poets, and authors who reflect the beauty and complexity of our communities. By showcasing ancient traditions and their impact on emotional and mental wellbeing, we strive to foster connections and promote healing in our collective journey. In this edition, we honor the revolutionary work of Black poets. Thank you for joining us.
On the Horizon: Forthcoming Work
• Forthcoming Books & Projects
Whispers of Black Privilege/poetry collection in progress
• Titles-in-Progress
Salt Air & Soul Echoes
The Making of the Americas
• Speaking Engagements
Radiant Living Lecture Series - Cocoa Beach Public Library, January 26, 2026
Strong in the Broken Places - 6th Season begins October 30, 2025
Wise Women Gather Podcast - 2nd Series begins October 19, 2025