I finished a modest eight books this month, five as part of my month’s topic of POC SF/F (plans went slightly agley due to excessive employment and being distracted by the Deutscher Buchpreis longlist). Seven by women/POC altogether, three in German, none finished in Portuguese (another fairly long one on the go). Plus one standalone short story, which I won’t count.
- Am Samstag gehen die Mädchen in den Wald und jagen Sachen in die Luft — Fiona Sironic
- Cursed Bunny — Bora Chung, tr. Anton Hur
- Das gute Übel — Samanta Schweblin, tr. Marianne Gareis
- The Space Between Worlds — Micaiah Johnson
- Die Ausweichschule — Kaleb Erdmann
- Frankenstein in Baghdad — Ahmed Saadawi, tr. Jonathan Wright
- Jamaica Ginger and Other Concoctions — Nalo Hopkinson
- Bandigoat — Rakesh Khanna (ed.)
- Red Letter Day — Winifred Burton
Starting with the project books, The Space Between Worlds was one of my highlights of the year: a parallel world SF story with a twist, where the marginalised in society have acquired an unusual niche. The multiple worlds (in several senses) give Johnson space to explore political and philosophical ideas through a fascinating set of characters.
Frankenstein in Baghdad was my only other project novel. The premise is fascinating: what better place for a creature made from spare body parts than post-invasion Baghdad? The sleazy world of booze and prostitutes (not sure how realistic) which most of the characters inhabit is also eye-opening. It dragged a bit at times, when the creature seemed to be roaming around to no particular purpose, but it reached a satisfying conclusion.
There were also three collections of short stories: Jamaica Ginger and Other Concoctions contains mostly rather slight pieces in terms of plot and character, but it’s Hopkinson’s voice which is the thing. The Jamaican vernacular was lovely to immerse myself in once a day.
The second collection, Bandigoat, arrived just in time to finish on Halloween. Again mostly short pieces by writers from various parts of India, the standout for me was the concluding The Legend of Rani Grace, which combines a satisfying plot, sweet characters, and a tremendous fairytale mythic power.
The third, Cursed Bunny is a belter. On the body/folk horror/SF spectrum, these stories sometimes gave me the impression that I’d always known them, which I take as a good sign, but they’re also rooted in Chung’s own very sound politics.
I don’t count Red Letter Day as a book, because it’s a standalone story (and I read it in the early hours of All Saints’ Day), but it deserves a brief mention: silly but fun, it’s worth 20 minutes of your time. Also, the Asasabonsam family helped me to understand the villainous Asanbosam in O último ancestral, a Brazilian SF/F book which I didn’t manage to finish in time).
Then the three books in German: Das gute Übel is by Samanta Schweblin and therefore a guaranteed banger. The often longish short stories give room for the plots and characters to develop, especially in the wonderful Das Auge in der Kehle (seemingly a riff on Carver’s A Small, Good Thing).
Finally, I read two of the Deutscher Buchpreis shortlist (the winner, Die Holländerinnen, hopefully this coming month): Am Samstag gehen die Mädchen in den Wald und jagen Sachen in die Luft has of course an outstanding title, and the rest of the book is pretty good. It’s in a near-future, climate-fiction mildly dystopian setting, but it’s real issue is with the social dystopia which we’re already in the middle off. One nice super-Bechdel feature: all the characters just happen to be women, and the only romantic relationships are lesbian.
I liked Die Ausweichschule even more: an autofictional novel about a young author trying to write about a school shooting he experienced as a child, there’s a lot of humane humour in the book, especially in the Setzian dialogue.
Next month looks a bit messy, but should be mainly a mix of more POC/SFF and O Canada (there being a two-book overlap between the two). I’m also spending quite a lot of reading time on the APS group read of Bleak House, so we’ll see what happens.