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S for Solidarity: Revolutionary Poetics in NO GODS, NO MONSTERS

April 19, 2021 Theodore McCombs

Cadwell Turnbull's new novel — the first in a trilogy — imagines the hard, uncertain work of a fantastical justice.

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In Reviews Tags Cadwell Turnbull, No Gods, No Monsters, No Gods No Monsters, Black Lives Matter, African-American speculative fiction, The Lesson
1 Comment

A Spectral Revhue: Review of Craig Laurance Gidney’s Novel

October 23, 2020 Theodore McCombs

Craig Laurance Gidney’s Marsh-bell Queen is half muse, half greedy ghost, and all fascinating.

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In Reviews Tags A Spectral Hue, Craig Laurance Gidney, African-American speculative fiction, Black Speculative Fiction, Art, Theodore McCombs, Queer Literature
Comment

Utopias and Nightmares: Stories of Omelas

June 5, 2020 C.S. Peterson
The Nightmare. Henry Fuseli, 1781. A very white woman, a very dark nightmare.

The Nightmare. Henry Fuseli, 1781. A very white woman, a very dark nightmare.

What could be more speculative at this moment than a vision of utopia? Utopia’s are hard to write. First, there’s convincing the reader that it’s possible at all. Contributor C.S. Peterson explores the haunting utopian visions of N. K. Jemisin, Ursula K. Le Guin, Aliette de Bodard, and S.L. Huang

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In Appreciations Tags CS Peterson, African-American speculative fiction, Ursula K. Le Guin, How Long 'Til Black Future Month, The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas, The Ones Who Stay and Fight
1 Comment

Celebrating Black Speculative Fiction 2020

February 28, 2020 Fiction Unbound
Mark Bradford, Realness, 2016. Mixed media on canvas; 108.25 x 168.5 in. Denver Art Museum Collection

Mark Bradford, Realness, 2016. Mixed media on canvas; 108.25 x 168.5 in. Denver Art Museum Collection

For Black History Month, some favorite short stories and novels by new and classic black SF/F writers.

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In Appreciations Tags Black Speculative Fiction, Theodore McCombs, CS Peterson, CH Lips, Gemma Webster, Tochi Onyebuchi, Christopher Caldwell, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Jordan Casteel, Celeste Rita Baker, African-American speculative fiction
Comment

For Those Who Dream of Fire: “Riot Baby” by Tochi Onyebuchi, Reviewed

January 17, 2020 Gemma Webster
Riot Baby by Tochi Onybuchi cover art features a close-up photo of the face of a young black woman with the title jumbled across it. Cover design by Jaya Micele. Cover photo © Getty Images.

Riot Baby by Tochi Onybuchi cover art features a close-up photo of the face of a young black woman with the title jumbled across it. Cover design by Jaya Micele. Cover photo © Getty Images.

Reader be warned: Riot Baby by Tochi Onyebuchi, coming out from Tor.com, is not for the faint of heart. That said, you should definitely read it. This book is violent because the lives of the children of Compton in the ‘90s were violent. Whenever a book opens with violence told nonchalantly, you have to know you are in for a lot of it. If you liked HBO’s Watchmen, you will also enjoy Riot Baby. The book opens with a scene on a school bus with the kids inside throwing Crip signs at the Bloods on the street. When a Blood boards the bus and holds a gun to a kid’s head, we see that our narrator, Ella, is an astute observer of her world.  

“Ella can see in the gangbanger’s eyes that he’s got no compunctions about it, the guy would meet disrespect with murder.”
— Riot Baby by Tochi Onyebuchi

This is the reality of Ella’s world. Ella’s not only a keen observer; her powers are supernatural and continually unfold throughout the book. When we first meet her, we see that she can perceive the future for herself and for others. This ability comes at a cost—she not only experiences the emotional trauma of seeing people dying around her but also feels it physically. Coming from a neighborhood where violence is quotidian, this is a heavy burden for Ella to bear.  

Onyebuchi’s language is spare but there is poetry in the beauty of his observations and in the way he renders relationships. 

“Brother Harvey says a prayer for all of them; then he sends them back out to their parents or grandparents or people who act like their parents because they need to.”
— Riot Baby by Tochi Onyebuchi

The absence of family stability is clear but so too is the way the community comes together to take care of each other. There is love in this hard place. Ella’s family is no exception: her biggest source of stability is a woman she calls grandmother, though they are not related, and the love between them is big. She has an unreliable extremely religious pregnant mother. She does not have a father. She has some friends and connections, but she is a lonely character because of her powers, which her family demands she keep secret, and the foreknowledge that she will always be leaving. 

The story is set against the backdrop of violence perpetrated against black communities in America. The first time marker is the police beating of Rodney King in 1991, which set off the L.A. Riots. Ella’s brother, Kev, a.k.a. Riot Baby, is born as the chaos begins. When the family emerges from the hospital, they see their city burned to the ground. Other markers include the police murder of Sean Bell, Oscar Grant III, Walter Scott and the Charleston Church shooting. He also seems to allude to the shooting of Tyrone Harris Jr. at the Michael Brown anniversary protest, though I wasn’t sure. (I’d be interested to hear from anyone more well versed in the topic as not all events are given names.) Riot Baby moves through Compton, Harlem, Rikers and Watts, and the violent incidents carry us from 1991 to 2015 through the terrifying America we know and then moves into a speculative future of the America we might get. 

This book touches on a theme I have been curious about for a long time and that is the notion of freedom. How much do we actually have? What makes a person feel free? Something that I love about genre literature is the capacity it has for tackling big questions and for dealing with villainy at the systemic level. This book does both beautifully. 

“Prison’s weird like that. All types of absurd shit happens here, and you just need the patience to step back and watch it happen. Maybe that comes with time. Maybe not. Maybe you spend your entire sentence here getting the shit kicked outta you. Maybe they kill you in here. But maybe you make it out. Not from behind bars, but out of wherever it is they try to put you when they put you behind bars.”
— Riot Baby by Tochi Onyebuchi

This book is great for readers who are looking to learn about the modern oppression of Black Americans while reading an entertaining story about siblings, power and freedom and whether the right course of action is just to burn it all down. 

Riot Baby is available now for pre-order. Get it from your local bookstore in person or online. Or, if you must, the evil empire will certainly have it too. 


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S for Solidarity: Revolutionary Poetics in NO GODS, NO MONSTERS
Cadwell Turnbull, No Gods, No Monsters, No Gods No Monsters, Black Lives Matter, African-American speculative fiction, The Lesson

Cadwell Turnbull's new novel — the first in a trilogy — imagines the hard, uncertain work of a fantastical justice.

Cadwell Turnbull, No Gods, No Monsters, No Gods No Monsters, Black Lives Matter, African-American speculative fiction, The Lesson
Happy New Year from Fiction Unbound
Happy New Year from Fiction Unbound

Happy New Year - Welcome 2021

The Christmas Ghost Story We Need This Year
The Christmas Ghost Story We Need This Year

Victorians liked to tell ghost stories around the hearth at Christmas. Here’s an old-but-timely one you can share around yours, even if it involves Zoom and/or the Yule Log channel.

2020 Speculative Holiday Gift Guide from Fiction Unbound
2020 Speculative Holiday Gift Guide from Fiction Unbound

We’re almost done with this, um, interesting year. That in itself is cause to celebrate. (photo credit:Patrick A. Mackie)

The Empire of Gold - Djinn Kingdom of Daevabad Falls then Rises
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In this final novel of The Daevabad Trilogy, Ali, Nahri, and Dara are morally challenged beyond endurance by the rise of death magic in their beloved kingdom. How they respond changes everything.

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A Spectral Revhue: Review of Craig Laurance Gidney’s Novel
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Craig Laurance Gidney’s Marsh-bell Queen is half muse, half greedy ghost, and all fascinating.

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A Survey Course In Fear and Wonder
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There is so much out there to read, and until you get your turn in a time loop, you don’t have time to read it all to find the highlights.

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The Interrogation of Reality: Aimee Bender’s "The Butterfly Lampshade"
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In Reviews Tags Riot Baby, Tochi Onyebuchi, Tor.com, Gemma Webster, Black Lives Matter, Dystopia, Freedom, Prison, African-American speculative fiction
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You Can't Bury the Past

December 6, 2019 The Unbound Writers

Watchmen and Ishiguro’s The Buried Giant have more in common than you might think.

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In Speculations Tags Watchmen, Alan Moore, Dave Gibbons, HBO, Kazuo Ishiguro, Buried Giant, African-American speculative fiction, Dark
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LeVar Burton Reads Speculative Fiction

May 24, 2019 The Unbound Writers
levar burton reads.jpeg

LeVar Burton carries on the bright legacy of his show Reading Rainbow with his podcast, LeVar Burton Reads. We selected a few of our favorite speculative fiction stories from his collection of episodes to recommend.

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In Reviews Tags LeVar Burton, Reading Rainbow, LeVar Burton Reads, Podcasts, Samuel Marzioli, Multo, Ursula Vernon, Jackalope Wives, Ellen Klages, Singing on a Star, Tobias S. Buckell, The Galactic Tourist Industrial Complex, Ken Liu, Mono No Aware, The Paper Menagerie, Amanda Baldeneaux, Danyelle C. Overbo, Black speculative fiction, African-American speculative fiction
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"A People's Future of the United States"

April 5, 2019 The Unbound Writers
APFOTUS-cover.jpg

Dystopia can be fun, in the right hands, but time loops probably aren’t. Example: our own era. Fiction Unbound writers Gemma and Catie explore stories that consider what the future may bring based on where we are presently, in the new collection A People’s Future of the United States.

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In Reviews Tags speculative fiction, N.K. Jemisin, G. Willow Wilson, Violet Allen, Alice Sola Kim, Gemma Webster, CS Peterson, Black speculative fiction, African-American speculative fiction
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"Black Leopard, Red Wolf": A Knife to the Neck of Genre and Gender Tropes

March 15, 2019 CH Lips
61N+U0SnDaL._SX327_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg

2015 Man Booker winner Marlon James embraces epic fantasy with a non-conforming, lightning-paced tale that up-ends every expectation.

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In Reviews Tags CH Lips, Kazuo Ishiguro, Marlon James, African-American speculative fiction
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Celebrating Black Speculative Fiction: Some Favorites

February 15, 2019 The Unbound Writers
Black speculative fiction.jpg

For Black History Month, some favorite short stories by new and classic black SF/F writers.

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In Appreciations Tags N.K. Jemisin, W.E.B. Du Bois, Charles W. Chesnutt, Nisi Shawl, Rivers Solomon, Cadwell Turnbull, Phenderson Djeli Clark, Black History Month, African-American speculative fiction, Southern Gothic, Victor LaValle, Lisa Mahoney, Danyelle C. Overbo, Amanda Baldeneaux, Theodore McCombs, Jon Horwitz-White, CH Lips
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"How Long ‘Til Black Future Month?": The Book Born Great

December 21, 2018 Sean Cassity
how long.jpg

If three consecutive novel Hugos have not convinced you N. K. Jemisin is a modern master, this collection will bridge the gap.

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In Reviews Tags N.K. Jemisin, How Long 'Til Black Future Month, Anthology, Sean Cassity, African-American speculative fiction
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The Black God's Drums: Steampunk of the African Diaspora

August 23, 2018 Sean Cassity
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The Black God’s Drums beats a hammer of imagination against the anvil of history and forges a dense alternate history.

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In Reviews Tags Black God's Drums, P. Djèlí Clark, Steampunk, Alternate History, African-American speculative fiction
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Binti is back! Celebrating the new hardcover editions

July 20, 2018 Amanda Baldeneaux
binti trilogy  banner.jpg

We love Binti! We’re celebrating the re-release of Okorafor’s Hugo and Nebula award-winning trilogy in beautiful hardcover editions with an appreciation of the difficulties involved in coming of age, intergalactic exploration, and saving the world, all at the same time.

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In Appreciations Tags Binti, Binti: Home, Binti: The Night Masquerade, Nnedi Okorafor, Amanda Baldeneaux, Science Fiction, African-American speculative fiction
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"Children of Blood and Bone": Tomi Adeyemi's Blockbuster Debut

April 20, 2018 C.S. Peterson
COBAB Adeyemi.jpg

Adeyemi's breakout debut features a richly drawn world inspired by West African traditions, compassionate social commentary, and a new take on magic.

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In Reviews Tags Tomi Adeyemi, CS Peterson, West African Traditions, afrofuturism, Young Adult Fantasy, African-American speculative fiction
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"A Wrinkle in Time": Fiction Unbound Reviews the Film [Spoiler Warning]

March 23, 2018 The Unbound Writers
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Going from beloved classic book to blockbuster movie is a tricky proposition. The writers at Fiction Unbound weigh in on what worked, and what didn't.

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In Reviews Tags Danyelle C. Overbo, Amanda Baldeneaux, Sean Cassity, A Wrinkle in Time, Books to Movies, African-American speculative fiction
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"Black Panther": Society as Superhero

March 2, 2018 The Unbound Writers
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The Unbound Writers review and revel in the newest Marvel super hero film: Black Panther

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In Reviews Tags Marvel, Black Panther, film, afrofuturism, CS Peterson, Amanda Baldeneaux, Danyelle C. Overbo, Theodore McCombs, Superheroes, African-American speculative fiction
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How We Are Haunted

March 31, 2017 Jon Horwitz-White

Steven Millhauser's short story "Phantoms” invites readers to consider the phantoms that haunt them.  Jon considers his phantoms and how they expose his complicity in perpetuating prejudice against trans people.

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In Speculations Tags Steven Millhauser, Jon Horwitz-White, Voices in the Night, Gender, Race, Feminism, Kiki, African-American speculative fiction
1 Comment

"Imago": The Next Evolution

January 20, 2017 The Unbound Writers
A very feminine version of Jodahs the ooloi construct

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Gemma Webster and Theodore McCombs conclude their three-part appreciation of Octavia Butler's groundbreaking Xenogenesis trilogy.

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In Appreciations Tags Octavia Butler, Xenogenesis, Imago, Adulthood Rites, Dawn, Gender, Space operas, Theodore McCombs, Gemma Webster, African-American speculative fiction
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Akin's Choice: Octavia Butler's "Adulthood Rites" as a Coming-of-Age Story

November 18, 2016 The Unbound Writers

In our second appreciation of Octavia Butler's Xenogenesis trilogy, we look at the second generation of Lilith's Brood and his embrace of self-determinism, even at the highest costs.

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In Appreciations Tags Octavia Butler, Xenogenesis, Gender, Hierarchical Masculinity, Tentacles, African-American speculative fiction
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Docility and Rage: Exploring Performance and Blackness in "The Ballad of Black Tom"

October 14, 2016 Jon Horwitz-White

Is the world ready to say goodbye to the docile black man trope?

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In Appreciations, Speculations Tags Victor LaValle, The Ballad of Black Tom, Jon Horwitz-White, African-American speculative fiction
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