Octavia's Brood: Science Fiction Stories from Social Justice Movements

by Walidah Imarisha (Editor)

Other authorsSheree Renee Thomas (Foreword), adrienne maree brown (Editor)
Paperback, 2015

Status

Checked out

Publication

AK Press (2015), Edition: 1st, 285 pages

Description

"Whenever we envision a world without war, without prisons, without capitalism, we are producing speculative fiction. Organizers and activists envision, and try to create, such worlds all the time. Walidah Imarisha and adrienne maree brown have brought twenty of them together in the first anthology of short stories to explore the connections between radical speculative fiction and movements for social change. The visionary tales of Octavia's Brood span genres -- sci-fi, fantasy, horror, magical realism -- but all are united by an attempt to inject a healthy dose of imagination and innovation into our political practice and to try on new ways of understanding ourselves, the world around us, and all the selves and worlds that could be. The collection is rounded off with essays by Tananarive Due and Mumia Abu-Jamal, and a preface by Sheree RenĂ©e Thomas" --… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member e2d2
This is another anthology that has pushed me into the realm of deliberation, contemplation, and wonderment. If I taught an English course, several of these stories would be on the syllabus. If (when?) I teach an intro to archives course "The Long Memory" by Morrigan Phillips will be the first
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reading on the syllabus. I loved these stories because they took me out of the center of the world and put me on the edge of an experience that I fundamentally cannot relate to. But I the best manner of fiction, that didn't matter because I could build empathy with those who read these stories and can relate more deeply with the characters and the experiences. Plus it's made me more anxious to get my tattoo scheduled.
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LibraryThing member LisCarey
As the subtitle makes clear, this is an anthology with an agenda, and it's an agenda that will inflame certain parties in recent kerfuffles in the science fiction community.

That said, this is an enjoyable collection. The stories are varied in setting, viewpoint, and kind. There's an incipient
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uprising against both a hoard of zombies and the politically repressive response to the zombie hoard. There's a gentle story of a woman attempting to reconnect with both her dead grandfather and her very much alive daughter, in an alternate history where the Civil War started in 1859, and the slaves won. A woman has to decide how she's going to react to a government that's finally responding to global warming, in a way that may be both too much, and not enough. One choice will cut her off from her mother and the place she grew up; another will cut her off from her partner and her life now. Is there a third choice, and can she do it? A young man who is the token black superhero opts out of the nonsense--until he finds out how he matters to young people, and a away to make a contribution that matters to him.

The authors include names all sf readers will recognize, like Tananarive Due and Terry Bisson, and people who've never written sf, or even fiction, before. Possibly for that reason, there are a number of stories that I read and thought, that's a set-up for a story I'd like to read the rest of...

Having said that, while there are a number of "beginning, middle, no actual end" pieces, there's nothing here I didn't enjoy. There's nothing here that has that special sense you get when mainstream writers go slumming and assume that "science fiction means it doesn't have to make sense." All the writers here respect their readers and their material. The editors didn't excuse lesser work because they wanted a particular name or a particular theme included. Despite being an anthology with an agenda, there's no pounding the reader over the head, except to the extent that happens with any themed anthology when you read straight through rather than dipping in.

I'll carry away from it a particular fondness for "The Token Superhero," by David Walker, and "The River," by Andrienne Maree Brown.

I've been saying "read" throughout this review; that's a very loose usage. I listened to the audiobook, and the narrator's voice is excellent, strong, clear, and expressive.

Recommended.

I received a free copy of the audiobook in exchange for an honest review.
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LibraryThing member roniweb
Mourning the end of this magnificent collection of stories
LibraryThing member SamMusher
The premise of this collection is that anytime you're doing social justice work, you're writing speculative fiction -- a premise I adore, as a person who became captivated by, and formed by, both social justice and science fiction at the same very young age. The writers of these stories are mostly
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not fiction writers but activists, shaping their activist vision into speculative fiction for the first time. I've never read anything like it.

The writers are virtually all of color, as are the editors. The tone of the stories is unlike any sci-fi I've read (though it is clearly informed by Octavia Butler, as the name would imply). All the endings are open-ended, beginnings more than endings and questions more than answers.

It's uneven, even more so than short story collections usually are. It's about ideas more than great writing. But if you are a reader of science fiction and you spend a lot of time thinking about justice, I strongly recommend you pick this up.
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LibraryThing member elenaj
Quite uneven. Some stories I really liked, some were okay, and some I disliked or skipped because they were not my thing. I guess that's to be expected in a multi-author collection like this.
LibraryThing member greeniezona
This had been sitting on my shelves unread for far too long because of my complicated feelings about anthologies, But once I finally picked this up, I was glad that I did. Like any anthology there were stories I loved and stories I failed to connect to, but the theme "exploring the connections
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between radical speculative fiction and movements for social change" is something I was deeply into.

Favorite stories were "the river" by adrienne maree brown (I really need to read more of her work soon!) and Tananarive Due's essay on Octavia Butler.
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LibraryThing member BarnesBookshelf
When I walked into a local bookstore and saw an anthology of short stories inspired by and dedicated to Octavia Butler, I had to buy and read it immediately. And it did not disappoint! I love seeing the diverse and unique worlds the authors bring to life in each of the short stories. My only
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problem with this book is that I want most of the short stories to be full-length novels. The authors set up such interesting worlds and start the characters on amazing journeys that I want to see where the story takes them! Some of the stories don't need to be grown into full novels, but, I mean, I for sure wouldn't turn it down!!

I also loved the essays at the end. The one about Star Wars brings up some very good points that we should all probably be thinking about. And the essay about Change in Butler's works put something I'd been noticing and thinking about in coherent and easy to understand terms. It was also fantastic to read about Butler from someone who knew her when she was alive. RIP Octavia, but wherever you are, I hope you know your legacy lives on.
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Language

Original language

English

Original publication date

2015-03-23

Physical description

285 p.; 5.5 inches

ISBN

1849352097 / 9781849352093

UPC

884259899307

Local notes

anthologies
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