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tishywishy's review
4.0
I didn't expect to connect with every story but the ones I did connect with were very enjoyable. There is a lot of variety and tales from Africa, Asia, the Americas and the Caribbean. It was refreshing and heart warming to read Lisa Allen-Agostini's work that intermingled sci-fi and traditional J'ouvert. My favourite was Monstro by Junot Díaz - which unfortunately will not become a full novel and I'm slightly distraught because I did NOT want that story to end.
emath98's review
adventurous
challenging
emotional
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
4.25
sarabz's review
4.0
An excellent collection of stories. The breadth is impressive with diversity among the authors, styles, subjects. I didn't love every single story, but there were several that were amazing and it was great to be introduced to new authors whose work I will definitely be following.
theementallyill's review
3.5
It wasnt bad, i just lowered the rating because i wasnt interested in a lot of the stories and ended up skipping them
sizrobe's review
4.0
Like all collections, this had some great stories and some stinkers. It's advertised as Afrofuturist, but actually contained a pretty wide array of cultural backgrounds, like Ainu and Navajo and a lot of Caribbean stuff.
Highlights include
*Haunted Native American house built on a white people burial ground
*Buddy cop story where one of the cops is a ghost
*The fate of the Earth decided on a game of baseball
*African pseudovampires
*People getting high off of eating angels' bodies
*Southeast Asian steampunk
Highlights include
*Haunted Native American house built on a white people burial ground
*Buddy cop story where one of the cops is a ghost
*The fate of the Earth decided on a game of baseball
*African pseudovampires
*People getting high off of eating angels' bodies
*Southeast Asian steampunk
shonatiger's review
4.0
Some really interesting stories; a few really hairy ones. Only one or two that I skimmed over because they were so weird.
nany007's review
3.0
A blend of sci-fi and Dominican life?? Odd but still done well, especially for a short story. Almost like hearing your super Dominican cousin tell a crazy story. I continue to find Diaz's short stories interesting if not for their odd plot lines, for their very funny story-telling approach. For the record, I don't mean "funny" in a comedic way, but "funny" in a .. "it's funny 'cuz it's true" tone.
mmelibertine's review
3.0
This was a very hit or miss collection for me. It has a refreshingly wide range of styles, moods, and settings. There are some striking stories here, and very interesting characters and rich worlds to explore. That said, I think some stories would be better suited to novellas or novels than one-shots, as sometimes the complexity and depth of detail can make some of the stories less accessible than others. Still, it's well worth a read, and I hope to see more such projects in the future!
pezski's review
5.0
In recent years I've been making an effort to read more broadly, and my encounters with [a:Octavia E. Butler|29535|Octavia E. Butler|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1242244143p2/29535.jpg], [a:Nnedi Okorafor|588356|Nnedi Okorafor|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1507148868p2/588356.jpg] and [a:N.K. Jemisin|2917917|N.K. Jemisin|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1438215930p2/2917917.jpg] have brought me into the sphere of Afrofuturism. I'd been yearning to delve deeper so this seemed the perfect find
I'm aware there is much debate about what exactly Afrofuturism is, and the "and Beyond" of this title should have suggested to me that editor [a:Bill Campbell|485442|Bill Campbell|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1193610344p2/485442.jpg] trawls his net widely; there are the kind of thing that I might have expected (although somehow I expected nothing in particular, and thought myself wide open, clearly I carry the cultural baggage of of a certain age and ethnicity and gender and geography and class and experience so the stories that showed a standard SF future but with a Afrocentric slant, or some variant from a past less dominated by European colonialism - or simply from a point of view not rooted in that history.
That would have been plenty to both sate and whet my appetite, but there is more here. It is almost misleading to call this anthology Afrofuturism (if that is the use of a fashionable term for attention, it is forgivable); this is a collection of fictions of inclusion, of voices of groups marginalised in art and culture, their voices and viewpoints. This collection is a shining example of the joy of exploration beyond one's usual boundaries. The standard of the stories is superb (not every single one to my taste, for instance the few ultra-shorts, but I am not really a fan of flash-fiction) and there are a handful of tales that took my breath away - those by [a:Victor LaValle|1762294|Victor LaValle|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1280959466p2/1762294.jpg], [a:N.K. Jemisin|2917917|N.K. Jemisin|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1438215930p2/2917917.jpg], [a:Ernest Hogan|174331|Ernest Hogan|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1337050391p2/174331.jpg], [a:S.P. Somtow|81037|S.P. Somtow|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1207602392p2/81037.jpg], [a:Junot Díaz|55215|Junot Díaz|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1487667538p2/55215.jpg] - and I'm sure others I'm leaving off- were the highlights.
One of the joys of anthologies is finding writers I may not have otherwise come across, and this has certainly opened my horizons. It is a perfect illustration of two of my favourite quotes:
"Reading is an exercise in empathy; an exercise in walking in someone else's shoes for a while." Malorie Blackman
“Fiction gives us empathy: it puts us inside the minds of other people, gives us the gifts of seeing the world through their eyes. Fiction is a lie that tells us true things, over and over.” Neil Gaiman
So read widely. Read people who are not like you. Read people who have different experiences, different histories, different outlooks. Read colour, read gender, read sexuality.
Read difference.
I'm aware there is much debate about what exactly Afrofuturism is, and the "and Beyond" of this title should have suggested to me that editor [a:Bill Campbell|485442|Bill Campbell|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1193610344p2/485442.jpg] trawls his net widely; there are the kind of thing that I might have expected (although somehow I expected nothing in particular, and thought myself wide open, clearly I carry the cultural baggage of of a certain age and ethnicity and gender and geography and class and experience
Spoiler
47 year old, white male, North of England and the rest if messy, for the recordThat would have been plenty to both sate and whet my appetite, but there is more here. It is almost misleading to call this anthology Afrofuturism (if that is the use of a fashionable term for attention, it is forgivable); this is a collection of fictions of inclusion, of voices of groups marginalised in art and culture, their voices and viewpoints. This collection is a shining example of the joy of exploration beyond one's usual boundaries. The standard of the stories is superb (not every single one to my taste, for instance the few ultra-shorts, but I am not really a fan of flash-fiction) and there are a handful of tales that took my breath away - those by [a:Victor LaValle|1762294|Victor LaValle|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1280959466p2/1762294.jpg], [a:N.K. Jemisin|2917917|N.K. Jemisin|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1438215930p2/2917917.jpg], [a:Ernest Hogan|174331|Ernest Hogan|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1337050391p2/174331.jpg], [a:S.P. Somtow|81037|S.P. Somtow|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1207602392p2/81037.jpg], [a:Junot Díaz|55215|Junot Díaz|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1487667538p2/55215.jpg] - and I'm sure others I'm leaving off- were the highlights.
One of the joys of anthologies is finding writers I may not have otherwise come across, and this has certainly opened my horizons. It is a perfect illustration of two of my favourite quotes:
"Reading is an exercise in empathy; an exercise in walking in someone else's shoes for a while." Malorie Blackman
“Fiction gives us empathy: it puts us inside the minds of other people, gives us the gifts of seeing the world through their eyes. Fiction is a lie that tells us true things, over and over.” Neil Gaiman
So read widely. Read people who are not like you. Read people who have different experiences, different histories, different outlooks. Read colour, read gender, read sexuality.
Read difference.