One of the reasons I love science fiction, or speculative fiction as it’s often called now, is its range. The two books I have to recommend today are good examples of how the genre can contain very different kinds of stories that focus on disparate aspects of human nature in settings that are far removed from each other. However, in spite of the differences, the drive to examine human nature is always a common theme, and both of these have lots of insights to share. I hope you enjoy them as much as I did.
“Shards of Earth” by Adrian Tchaikovsky
A great space opera has to not only build a universe that’s (mostly) believable, full of interesting alien races, and bursting with galactic-scale politicking, but also find a way to bring the incomprehensible immensity of space to life. Tchaikovsky manages to do all that in spades, using his rambunctious cast of characters as canaries in the coal mine of the void. The crusty space scavenger crew that stumbles onto a universe-altering find is a well-worn trope, but sometimes tropes are tropes for a good reason. Captain Rollo and the rest of the Vulture God’s collection of oddballs bring a sense of humor and irreverence that provide a perfect counterbalance to the astronomical scale of the problems they stumble upon, problems that are embodied in the impossible questions that plague Idris and Solace as they try to figure out how to walk the thin line between personal and societal destruction. And underneath it all, unspace waits, hiding ineffable terrors that could make all the problems of the known irrelevant in the face of cosmic nihility. If you like rollicking space adventures with interesting tech, well-developed xenopolitics, and lovable characters, you’ve found your next read.
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“Womb City” by Tlotlo Tsamaase
I love when a book blends multiple genres and subgenres together into a single chaotic mishmash. Tsamaase draws from the traditions of cyberpunk, cosmic horror, and Afro-futurism to create xer own unique world, paying homage to those who came before like Philip K. Dick, H.P. Lovecraft and Octavia Butler, while also expanding their ideas and challenging the societal and political structures they operated in. Government surveillance and state-controlled exploitation of women’s bodies are pressing issues in any society, but they seem to be especially prevalent given the current (and future?) state of our world, and Tsamaase examines them the way only the best authors of speculative fiction can. The writing and story structure can be jarring at times, but those stylistic choices help build the overwhelming sense of confusion and dissociation that Nelah experiences as she falls deeper into the rabbit hole of truth in a society built on lies. Part conspiracy theory, part whodunit, and part techno-dystopia, this story transfers the primordial rage of disaffected women into a new body that has the power to bring the whole system crashing down.
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