Urban Renewal

What a great time to read about a city loved by so many.

Three-time best novel
winner N.K. Jemisin's
latest book.
(Image via Goodreads)

For the past year, New York City has been inaccessible to travelers, tourists, and those seeking to commune with its genius loci (though, if Jemisin’s interpretation is correct, this is what the City would prefer). Hardcore urbanists from all over will get a particular thrill from a book like The City We Became, which invokes the boroughs as characters and evokes memories of wanders through their streets.

With a plot kicked off by a young homeless man discovering his destiny as the avatar of New York City, the story involves a larger-scale need to rally the Burroughs to defend urbanism against community-destroying White supremacy in the form of a Lovecraftian horror. This entity lashes out and seeks to destroy New York out of a fear of culturally-rich diverse communities. As with many Lovecraftian horrors, significant elements of the unknown and unknowable are left to the reader’s imagination.

Jemisin’s talent for creating characters we care about surviving and surpassing structural barriers took center stage. Every new superhero needs an origin story and this story provides this by expanding on the creative city hero concept Jemisin introduced in the original short story “The City Born Great.” While a minor quibble, the cameo character Bel seems more Aussie than British to us and no one in our book club remembers seeing a pound sterling note in about three decades. More decisively, the nod to her sensitivity readers in the acknowledgements was appreciated, however some members of the book club felt the characters were reductive and that the narrative occasionally relied on telling the readers rather than showing the heroic status of the protagonists.

This is a novel that is subtly intertextual, paying homage to Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere, and subverting the works of H.P. Lovecraft. In fact, the allusions to Lovecraft are so integral to the text that the occasional forays into Lovecraftian prose became distracting to at least one of our members. Those who dislike the way Lovecraft wrote may find some of the prose difficult. 

But despite being steeped in the ideas behind famous fantasy works, The City We Became sometimes

Given how much this novel is in conversation with
both the city of New York, and the works of H.P. 
Lovecraft, it is worth noting how Lovecraft had
an irrational dislike of New York. 
(Image via NPR)

seems more aligned with the narrative traditions of magical realism; it sometimes isn’t clear where the metaphor ends and what portions of the story are supposed to be read literally. Readers who lean towards more literary novels will likely enjoy this more than those who seek out pulp adventures.

As expected, and true to Jemisin’s style, there's a satisfying through line in The City We Became that illuminates a determinative cultural construction. The divisiveness that we've all seen play out in the US over the past decade or so is simplified to an “urban vs rural” or “white vs non-white” dichotomy in this novel, and we suspect it will play an important role in the next two books. The fact that this tension was not resolved with an unbelievable love-in between the Burroughs (a few of us were dreading that type of ending), and the recognition that spatial and cultural practices, not necessarily political boundaries, provide the glue for urban gestalt provided a graceful end to a fantasy novel focused on character development.

Fantastical stories expect some level of abandon by readers, and for the most part that was easy to do with this book. We were a bit tripped up by a few easy-outs, however, including a pep talk that reminded us of Rhonda Byrne’s The Secret and a few convenient but sticky plot holes filled in by bystanders inexplicably unable to see things or eagerly accepting dubious explanations. American exceptionalism also peeked around a few corners (The repetitious refrain: “this time is different / never happened in the other cities”) but this will likely support the book finding its audience.

Given Jemisin’s well-earned following and the timely depiction of a much-loved survivor city, we are glad to see The City We Became on this year’s Hugo short list.

A People's Future Without Labour

Forty years ago, Boston University history professor Howard Zinn refused to cross a picket line, in a

Howard Zinn speaking to one
of his colleagues during the 1979
Boston University staff strike.
(Image via HowardZinn.org)

show of solidarity with striking clerical workers at his institution. Speaking with the workers on the picket line motivated him to help raise the level of labour history awareness in his country.

He came to believe that the inclusion of labour narratives in popular history books could help. The resulting work, A People’s History Of The United States, has become an influential and controversial classic that examines previously untold stories of workers and marginalized peoples. 

Any author or editor attempting to claim the mantle of Zinn’s work has an unenviable task ahead of them. But when SF luminaries John Joseph Adams and Victor LaValle — both of whom have produced top-quality works — announced a short story collection whose title is an homage to Zinn, we were very excited. 

Given the provocative and timely premise of A People’s Future Of The United States, we approached the collection of stories with enthusiasm. Unfortunately, the collection as a whole failed to live up to the grand ideas described by the editors.

The book’s introduction is one of the strongest parts of the collection. Over the course of eight pages, Adams sets out the premise of the work, and alludes to the fact that many of the same omissions in mainstream historical narratives are reflected in how we imagine possible futures. Like all good

Even the cover of A People's
Future includes the shadow
of the word "History."
(Image via Goodreads) 

introductions, it encourages the reader to keep reading. 

By definition, collections provide access to a variety of works and it’s rare, perhaps even impossible, to expect that all readers will universally enjoy every contribution. Our book club enjoyed Sam J. Miller’s excellent parable about surveillance, privacy and the policing of heteronormative behaviours. Omar L. Akkad’s harrowing story about internment camps will stay with readers. G. Willow Wilson’s takedown of the privatization agenda is exactly the sort of work we had hoped to read when we picked up this volume. Seanan McGuire’s story includes a ray of hope and helps enrich the anthology.

Questions of race, class and gender are important to explore and have all-too-often been ignored in science fiction. 

We would argue that because science fiction is an inherently political genre, it is of paramount importance to create inclusive futures we can believe in. Some of the stories in this volume do indeed ably tackle topics of race, class and gender. But the topic of labour is almost entirely neglected. 

It is disappointing that an anthology that so explicitly aims to address cultural blindspots has reproduced one itself. 

In comparison, the index to Zinn’s classic history book includes a full page of references to organized labour movements. At a rough estimate, 30 per cent of the book deals with the struggles of traditional union movement organizing, and workers rights are integral to much of the rest of the text. 

Zinn examines at length the general strikes of 1934, 1936, 1938. He tackles women’s roles in the

Howard Zinn's book talks about Joe Hill
and the Industrial Workers Of The World.
(Image via Wikipedia)

labour movement, both prior to the Wagner Act, and afterwards. He talks about how women used the union movement to affect change long before there was an organized feminist movement. He chronicles organized labour’s transition from being mostly indifferent (or antagonistic) to race relations to becoming allies of the civil rights movement. He tackles the philosophical questions that drove a wedge between the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and the American Federation of Labour (AFL) in the 1930s. 

It is, in our minds, staggering to think that a book positioned as the spiritual heir to A People’s History Of The United States could completely ignore the role of labour in class and other struggles. It’s not as if issues related to workers’ rights in the United States have been solved. 

Relatedly, some of the stories didn’t seem to exist in a “People’s Future” at all, but rather in a fantastical alternate universe that has little connection to the political environment framing this collection. Celestial beings with snakes growing from their heads and dragons are fun to read about but we found it hard to make a connection to a future United States in at least a few of the stories in this collection. Even when we liked the stories individually, the fantastical elements put them at odds with the idea of a real-world “Future Of The United States.” 

In standard texts about history, labour had been ignored; it didn't fit in with military or great man history. Zinn changed the focus and brought labour to the centre. This collection failed to do that for science fiction.

There are significant current labour struggles that are going to define whatever future people in the United States will share: the fight against precarious employment, the tensions inherent within two-tiered union contracts, evolving questions around scope-of-work issues to name a few. This is an area that is rife with dramatic science fictional potential, but is being neglected in the genre. 

With slightly different editorial choices, A People’s Future Of The United States could have been an essential text for progressive science fiction fans. As it is, we have a short story collection with good stories in it, but which is less than the sum of its parts.

The Stone Sky is the most artful book, and that's why it deserves to win.

N.K. Jemisin’s The Stone Sky is a warning about ravaging the Earth, made relatable through the story

There's a reason the first two Broken
Earth books won the Hugo Award -
It's the same reason The Stone Sky
deserves to make it a clean sweep:
These books have emotional resonance.
(Images via Goodreads.com) 

of a shattered mother-daughter relationship.

Well-known visual art critic Edmund Feldman once argued that when considering any work, one should consider four basic questions. To paraphrase these questions, and repurpose them to the literary world, they might be summarized as: what does the work set out to achieve, what tools and techniques does the artist use to achieve those goals, is the work successful in what what the artist set out to achieve, and finally how does it make you feel. Great art, it is suggested, is that which provides satisfactory answers to these questions.

By this standard, The Stone Sky, the most ambitious of this year’s Hugo shortlisted novels, succeeds admirably. As such, it is the work that deserves to be recognized with the award.

As the concluding book in the Broken Earth Trilogy, The Stone Sky aims to provide a resolution to several intertwined storylines, to complete several grand metaphors and to deliver a powerful message on relationships. In this work, humans are at once our own worst enemies and our only hope for redemption. We see in The Stone Sky how hubris has brought the Earth to near ruination. In the distant past, thirsting for more power, humans drew more and more from the Earth. In a terrible accident, the moon was pushed into a different orbit causing chaos on Earth. In the present, two factions are trying to bring the moon back: one wants to bring it straight into the Earth destroying life, the other wants to return it to its former orbit. Both claim to want to end the chaos and suffering on Earth and both intend to do it with extreme interventions on the natural world.

The immediate relevance of the metaphor should not be lost on readers. Today, Earth is changing in

The Broken Earth trilogy has
inspired readers.
Image via BrokenEarth Tumblr.

ways that resemble the catastrophic fifth seasons of the Broken Earth trilogy. Humans are at fault for these changes. Our extreme interventions have caused pain and suffering for people, plants and animals. We regularly experience storms, floods and droughts that thousands of years ago would have been so unusual as to be considered divine punishments. We are also working on new and different extreme interventions that will return some balance to the world.

The setting and structure of the series are ambitious, and Jemisin’s prose is impactful and engrossing. But more than any of the other novels on this year’s shortlist, The Stone Sky has an emotional core with well-crafted human relationships.

The main actors in the books are all tied together through a variety of relationships. Master-slave, lovers, mother-daughter. The treatment of people in each of these relationships affects decisions they are making now. Essun and Alabaster overcome previous trauma to form a new trust. The Guardian, Shaffa, goes after Nassun and using his knowledge of what he did to Essun gains the daughter’s trust. Nassun is lashing out at Essun after Essun was at best a questionable mother but acted from love in the best way she knew how.

“I think,” Hoa says slowly, “that if you love someone, you don’t get to choose how they love you back."”

The misunderstandings and mistakes lead to conflict. Communication leads to understanding.

“Don’t be patient. Don’t ever be. This is the way a new world begins.”

Each book of this trilogy had highlights that add up to an overall story that is is cohesive. When books are well done, we shouldn’t punish them for being the third but reward them for doing it well. N.K. Jemisin would be the first “threepeat” in Hugo history and for this trilogy she deserves it. It is a well-crafted story relevant to our time with timeless messages.

While other shortlisted novels in 2018 may answer Feldman’s first three questions satisfactorily, only The Stone Sky is a novel that offers a profundity of emotion, and that is what elevates it above the other works.

(This is one of two blog posts in which members of our book club make the case for the book they think should win. The second one on New York 2140 can be found at this link.)