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A review by readingwithhippos
Falling in Love with Hominids by Nalo Hopkinson
3.0
My reactions to the stories in Falling in Love with Hominids were all over the map. Hopkinson is a Caribbean-Canadian speculative fiction writer with quite possibly the biggest imagination I’ve ever come across. Whether her stories work for you or not will depend on your ability to hang with the weirdness.
My favorite story, entitled “Emily Breakfast,” was an outwardly silly tale of a couple whose chicken goes missing one morning. Their three chickens are named Lunch, Dinner, and Emily Breakfast. (Because Emily the chicken already had a name when they got her, so they just tacked the “breakfast” part on the end. Obviously.) The distressed chicken owners are aided in the hunt for the missing chicken by their winged cat. Also, the chickens can breathe fire, and a neighbor owns what she calls a “scuttle” of messenger lizards. It’s an absolute delight from start to finish.
Other stories weren’t as big a hit with me. A couple were clearly for insiders, like the story taking place in a fictional world from a book series I haven’t read. Those I skimmed or skipped entirely, knowing I wasn’t the intended audience. Still, the good stories here are REALLY good. Hopkinson’s characters are refreshingly diverse—black, brown, straight, gay, male, female, teenaged, elderly—and they’re immediately knowable, despite whatever craziness might be happening around them. I don’t often get the feeling that an author had fun writing a book, but I just can’t imagine Hopkinson putting this stuff down on paper with anything but a playful smile on her face.
If you’ve ever seen an elephant’s skin up close and wanted to apply lotion to it, you and this book will probably get along famously.
More book recommendations by me at www.readingwithhippos.com
My favorite story, entitled “Emily Breakfast,” was an outwardly silly tale of a couple whose chicken goes missing one morning. Their three chickens are named Lunch, Dinner, and Emily Breakfast. (Because Emily the chicken already had a name when they got her, so they just tacked the “breakfast” part on the end. Obviously.) The distressed chicken owners are aided in the hunt for the missing chicken by their winged cat. Also, the chickens can breathe fire, and a neighbor owns what she calls a “scuttle” of messenger lizards. It’s an absolute delight from start to finish.
Other stories weren’t as big a hit with me. A couple were clearly for insiders, like the story taking place in a fictional world from a book series I haven’t read. Those I skimmed or skipped entirely, knowing I wasn’t the intended audience. Still, the good stories here are REALLY good. Hopkinson’s characters are refreshingly diverse—black, brown, straight, gay, male, female, teenaged, elderly—and they’re immediately knowable, despite whatever craziness might be happening around them. I don’t often get the feeling that an author had fun writing a book, but I just can’t imagine Hopkinson putting this stuff down on paper with anything but a playful smile on her face.
If you’ve ever seen an elephant’s skin up close and wanted to apply lotion to it, you and this book will probably get along famously.
More book recommendations by me at www.readingwithhippos.com