Book Review: Son of the Storm/Warrior of the Wind, by Suyi Davies Okungbowa

Cover of Warrior of the Wind, by Suyi Davies Okungbowa

The two books really feel like to me a study and critique of decaying imperial power, and what happens when that eroding power slips to the point where the imperium is visibly decaying, and starts to overcorrect and do truly shortsighted and ill-advised things in the quest to not only maintain the decaying status quo, but to reach back to a mythical golden era before that never really existed in the first place.

Book Review: Akata Warrior by Nnedi Okorafor

Keen fans of the Hugo Awards will be aware that 2018 marks the inaugural presentation of the World Science Fiction Society Award for Best Young Adult Book. The shortlist for this Hugo-adjacent award (which will, barring shenanigans at the AGM, henceforth be known as the Lodestar Award) includes Akata Warrior by Nnedi Okorafor. This is the […]

Book Review: Lagoon by Nnedi Okorafor

Lagos. It’s one of the most populous cities in the world and yet it is a city that is relatively mysterious to most Western audiences. Its geography, its nature, and even the languages spoken there (did you know the first language for many in Lagos is a Pidgin language and not English?) do not readily […]

Indy Genre: African Shorts

I get the sense that short films are often viewed as a way to develop skills and advertise those skills, or as a proof of concept for a feature-length film. I’m starting to see more and more short film available for general viewing on Youtube, Vimeo, and even Hulu as a way to reach audiences that […]

Cultural Tourists (Part 1): Publishing and Representation

One of my goals is to read as diverse literature as possible — at least those by authors outside of the US and the UK (since these two are the major players in the global publishing industry). The unfortunate reality is this:  I keep on failing. That’s not to say I don’t occasionally succeed; just […]