Afrofuturism/Speculative Fiction/Magic Realism

Octavia Butler was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame last week:

http://www.empsfm.org/programs/index.asp?categoryID=225

Samuel Delany's Dahlgren might actually make it to the big screen:

http://io9.com/5573604/will-a-nine-inch-nails-music-video-director-tackle-samuel...

I received the following books over the week from Amazon and used bookstore trip but won't get to them until at least August as my July pile is already quite huge.

Who Slashed Celanire's Throat? by Maryse Conde

Unburnable by Marie-Elena John, a book from harambeegirl's library

The Hundred Thousand Kingdom by N.K. Jemison. This is the first book in a trilogy and I have seen it mentioned on several blogs

Who Fears Death by Nnedi Okorafor. A June LT early reviewer book - post-apocalyptic tale set in Africa. The author has discussed on her blog some of the reaction she has received from male immigrants from Africa to her discussion of female genital mutilation and other aspects of the novel during her speaking tours at universities.

Delany's Dahlgren reviewed in a series of articles about Difficult Books

David Anthony Durham, besides having written literary fiction (mainstream) and historical fiction The Pride of Carthage, has written a fantasy series set in Africa. It begins with Acacia - he must be on about book 3 by now.

http://www.davidanthonydurham.com/

I'm not much of a fan of epic fantasy, but I will read SF and books with magical realism. So I haven't read the Durham nor will I probably read Nora Jemison's (thought I bought a copy to support her!). I did read Nnedi Okorafor's The Shadow Speaker and enjoyed it - I found it refreshing. I'm sending it to fannyprice now as she just read and reviewed Who Fears Death for the current issue of Belletrista and liked it. So, I thought she might like to read the earlier book.

I have a copy of Andrea Hairston's Mindscape but it's in the gigantic TBR pile.

Will see Chip Delany this coming week. If anyone is in the Boston area, Readercon is going on in the Burlington Marriott in Burlington, MA Thursday evening through Sunday. I'm pretty sure Chip Delany, David Anthony Durham, Nora Jemison and Andrea Hairston are among the 150 professional "guests". Nalo Hopkinson is one of the two Guests of Honor.
http://www.readercon.org/guests.htm

I'm still mourning Octavia Butler. Sigh.

avaland, the ReaderCon sounds like fun. Have a great time and Happy 4th!

goddesspt2, thank you for the Difficult Books link! I checked it out and I found it interesting. I plan on reading Proust sooner rather than later and I'll probably have plenty of reasons to refer to that site. I'm bookmarking it now. Thanks again.

You're welcome petersonvl.

There is an online excerpt from Samuel Delany's upcoming novel at the Boston Review.

It's not a book, but even years later I'm still bummed I missed seeing the film Pumzi when it made the festival rounds.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3elKofS43xM

Though I've not seen the film, it touched off one of those always-interesting conversations about the supposed "whiteness" of sci fi.