Posts Tagged ‘science fiction and fantasy’
I’m grateful for the opportunity to explore my feelings and relationship to the term ‘Afrofuturism’ in this recent essay for the online quarterly magazine South Write Large: Stories, Arts and Ideas for the Global South. Is this a term that you have heard a lot about? How do you engage with Afrofuturism?
My Unlikely Path to Afrofuturism
Afrofuturism is everywhere these days. From the staggering success of Black Panther to the revival of Octavia Butler’s works, especially the prescient Parable of the Sower written in 1993, to the award-winning novels by N. K. Jemisin, these books have ushered in a new moment. We’re not just talking about literature or film, but music, fashion design, visual arts, and social activism as well. What often gets lost or flattened, however, when a phenomenon enters the mainstream, is the nuance, history, and multiple viewpoints on said phenomenon. Read the rest of the essay here.
Reenu-You Is Out In the World: Thoughts about Book Covers, Review Copies and More!
Posted February 4, 2020
on:Reenu-You is about to have its second life. It has been published by Falstaff Books. I love the cover design by Natania Barron, Falstaff author and artist. In our back and forth conversations, we decided on a theme that implies a cityscape and a viral threat (in the book my virus has a spiral pattern) and that is more in line with covers of sci-fi books that are about epidemics. This cover has a grittier and darker feel than the original.

I love how Natania gets at the hair/beauty product idea with the scissors and styling tools in the main box.
I have been thinking a lot about cover designs. I’ve been very lucky that both Book Smugglers (the original publisher) and Falstaff have included their authors in cover design conversations. That is not always the case in publishing.
Whether you are traditionally or indie published, understanding the importance of the role of book covers in selling one’s book is essential. I found a recent episode from the Write-Minded podcast with an industry professional extremely valuable. Check out Brooke Warner and Grant Faulkner’s interview with Julie Metz (‘What Every Author Needs to Know about Cover Design’). Metz is an industry veteran and discusses everything authors need to know about covers from multiple perspectives (i.e. readers, publishers, designers). I found it highly informative and loved knowing the history of book cover design from the 20th century until now. Another takeaway is that authors aren’t always very good collaborators. They can sometimes be rigidly attached to a concept that falls way outside the norms for reader expectations for a particular type of book. Online, readers spend seconds skimming book covers, so there isn’t a lot of time to grab them visually. The professionals know what they are doing when they make suggestions to authors!
A request for reviews: Reviews of any length help authors. I have 18 reviews thus far on Amazon and 25 on Goodreads and I’d love more. Interested in reading Reenu-You and doing a short review for Amazon, Goodreads, etc.? And, short can mean one sentence. I would be happy to send you a digital copy for an honest review. It’s a novella, so it’s short and intense. It’s sci-fi with a twinge of psychological horror. If you are a very new reader of the blog and don’t know what Reenu-You is about, see below. If you’re still interested, email me at mtb@creativetickle.com
You can purchase the book on Amazon here. Also available at all online retailers.
Back Cover blurb:
What if a visit to the salon could kill you?
What if a hair product harbored a deadly virus?
Kat is an out of work ski instructor who just wants to pack up her deceased mother’s things, leave New York, and return to Aspen. Constancia is a talented but troubled young woman who just wants to start her first semester of college.
In different shops across New York City, they and hundreds of other women of color try a new hair relaxer called “Reenu-You.” Then things start to go horribly awry.
Within days, they find themselves covered in purple scab-like lesions—a rash that pulses, oozes, and spreads in spiral patterns. They are at the epicenter of a mysterious virus spreading throughout the city. As the outbreak spreads and new cases pop up in Black and Latino communities throughout New York, panic, anger, and questions fill the streets.
What is this virus and where did it come from?
Is it corporate malfeasance?
Or is this an orchestrated plot to kill minority women?
In the face of a terrifying and uncertain future, Kat, Constancia, and a small band of other affected women are forced to confront their deepest fears to save themselves and others. As the world crumbles around them, they will discover more about each other, learn about themselves, and draw strength to face the future together. Reenu-You looks at the social and political meanings of hair, female friendships, and viruses.
A Sneak Peek at My WIP for WITCHES, WARRIORS & WISE WOMEN Kickstarter Anthology
Posted December 12, 2019
on:I’m doing something I have never done before. I’m sharing a few paragraphs from my WIP for WITCHES, WARRIORS AND WISE WOMEN the Kickstarter funded anthology. The tentative title for my story is ‘Ditch Girl’ and is set in a post-apocalyptic world with a smidgen of urban fantasy. There are definitely witches in this story. This is a draft for your reading pleasure only.
BTW, we are 66% funded with only 3 days to go. I’d LOVE it if you would consider supporting this project and/or sharing the link. And, thanks to all of you who have already supported the project in various ways!
There are still VERY cool rewards and pledge levels available—help us fund this project and get some extra goodies for yourself. But hurry—the clock is ticking!
It will feature new fiction by me and Gail Martin, Paige Christie, Darin Kennedy, Alexandria Christian, Nicole Smith, JD Blackrose and many others.
Details here.
“Ditch Girl”
The cemetery never scared Welcome, even as a child. Cutting through it to get home provided the quickest route and allowed unrivaled use of her imagination. She would make up stories about people, looking for the oldest headstones. Most days after school, before it got dark, she’d pick an interesting gravestone, settle in and strike up a conversation. She’d share things that didn’t sit right in her mind.
She might say, “Ana Sterling of 1950, if you were here, I’d show you around Thistleview. Not that there’s very much to see. In your day, I bet you use to go into that old city called Tulsa, not too far from here. It’s not there anymore now, Ana.”
Or, “One day the preacher’s wife slapped me for not wearing a slip. After service, she asked me to come in the back to talk to her and before I knew it she had her beefy hand on me.
The preacher’s wife said, “Welcome, can’t you see your breasts are falling out that dress? Do you want to end up like your mother?”
Mama never said I had to wear a slip, Ana. I don’t even have a slip. I stopped going to church after that. The preacher’s wife don’t bother me no more. She don’t even speak to me at all. She just looks right through me as if I’m some piece of old cobweb. Were slips big in your day, Ana? I bet they were. People had money back then from what I’ve read. They went places that needed slips.”
On this day Welcome made her way through the forested part of the cemetery, where the red cedars were thickest and some of the oldest headstones lay. She paused and sniffed, noticing the coolness in this part of the cemetery. She then heard words sung by a female voice:
My funny valentine
Sweet comic valentine
You make me smile with my heart
Goosebumps pebbled her pale skin and she hunched into her ragged coat. The phrases repeated and Welcome looked toward the nearest stand of trees. She darted behind one and then another thinking that she had been followed by some of her stupid classmates.
After a few minutes of frantic searching and finding no singers (she knew no one in town that sounded as good as that voice), with every vein straining in her face, she listened.
Another female voice rang out, this one heavier:
We’re trying to come throu…
Come to us!
The moment seared her like when she waited for the once a month afternoon train. Pricks of excitement and danger bit into her, making her hop from foot to foot. She couldn’t make herself stand still. Nothing she had heard so far in her life sounded as good as these voices. They made her feel as if her favorite butterscotch candies were melting on her tongue. No, it was as if she floated in warm butterscotch candy. She ran up and down the stretch of the cemetery. Welcome overturned rocks, peeked behind headstones, climbed a small tree and searched for the origin of those voices until she could barely see in front of her.
Exhausted, she remembered her responsibilities. Mama will wonder where dinner is.
“Please, whatever you are come to me,” she said at last, the frustration catching in her throat. On rest of the walk home as the sun sank, a feeling of utter sadness swept over Welcome. Maybe everyone in town is right. I’m going crazy, like Mama.
***
I hoped you enjoyed this snippet. I’m sure that my opening and entire story will go through several drafts before I’m happy with it and send it on. I look forward to working with Jason Graves, publisher of Prospective Press and editor of this anthology.
October has been designated Black Speculative Fiction month when we especially pay attention to Black creators of fantasy, horror, and sci-fi! Luckily, there is still time to share some of my favorite writers with you and provide links to some great lists being circulated. If you don’t get to check out these writers now, the holiday season will be upon us shortly, so consider putting them on your list for yourself or as a gifts for others.
Nisi Shawl
When I was in graduate school and thought that I was the only Black person that loved and wanted to write science fiction, I luckily met Nisi Shawl who worked in a used bookstore in Ann Arbor, MI. She was the first person of color that I had serious conversations with about Black speculative fiction and ideas that would eventually would become known as ‘Afrofuturism’ many years later. This was probably more than 25 years ago. She was a mentor and friend and I have followed her career with great joy. If you don’t know her, you should. Her recent steampunk book Everfair received critical reviews. It re-imagines the Belgium Congo and asks what would have happened if African peoples had developed steam technology first. She is active in sci-fi circles and is a cultural critic. She also co-facilitates a workshop for writers called ‘Writing the Other’ which has become a standard for writers both in sci-fi and out for helping writers develop deeply diverse, human and grounded characters. Even though she moved away before I had come into my own as a writer, I owe Nisi Shawl a great debt for her vision and encouragement. Check her work out!
http://www.nisishawl.com/Everfair%20reviews.html
Nicole Givens Kurtz
Sisters of the Wild Sage is a wonderful collection of stories of the ‘weird west’ by Nicole Givens Kurtz. As I said in my review: “…it is dazzling, groundbreaking and compelling. We are privy to complex and memorable characters, mostly Black women and women of color and viscerally experience how they have to make a way out of no way and keep their dignity whole doing so. In several stories, Kurtz explores the challenges these women faced in a post-Reconstruction world that was sometimes indifferent, often hostile, and sometimes brimming with new possibilities. You’ll cheer and cry for them at every turn.”
Kurtz has turned me on to a whole new subgenre of speculative fiction! You can see the Author Q&A I did with her in the summer here.
https://www.amazon.com/Sisters-Wild-Sage-Weste…/…/0999852248
Tananarive Due
I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the work of Tananarive Due (tah-nah-nah-REEVE-doo). She’s an author who has won an American Book Award, an NAACP Image award and a British Fantasy Award. She primarily writes horror and you can see her in a new fantastic documentary that she produced: Horror Noire: A History of Black Horror (available on Shudder and it is excellent). One of her most popular series is the African Immortals which begins with My Soul to Keep.
Here’s a fantastic list put together by the Oakland Public Library! Enjoy!