conuly | Somebody asked for sci-fi as literature advice for their adolescent

I managed a short list, nothing but women writers. I ROCK! (Noteworthy, all the books he's previously read that are sci-fi are men of the school of writers that thinks women exist only as cardboard cutouts.)

Is she going to notice the contrast between my list and his already-done list? Will I ever be thanked for my tireless efforts on the behalf of diverse readers everywhere? HAHAHA no.

On a related note, I've been hemming and hawing about getting Winter Tide, and I saw a commentary that moved me towards the "no" side: Native Americans are not mentioned in that book.

As the poster noted, this is a glaring omission for an ancient sorta-human race situated in New England. What they didn't note is that it's also a glaring omission when we're talking about people interned during WWII. In real life, Japanese internees interacted with Native Americans - they had baseball games and basketball games and the like. In some cases, the internees were put to work building infrastructure with the hopes that the government could then resettle small reservations into one big (out of the way, isolated) reservation. In other cases, the internment camps were on reservations. So it's sort of a twofer here.

(Also, if I'm reading these synopses right and the main character ends up in NYC, I feel this is an appropriate place to point out that in that time, Mohawk ironworkers were hard at work building all our skyscrapers. Not that I, personally, bump into ironworkers all the time and it'd be an oversight not to mention this in a story of my life (actually, I think I've known two), but I'm just saying.)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

ioplokon

yes, it feels like many fiction/historical fiction writers don't know what to do w/ native americans outside of like, massacres and pulling from the Western genre (which lbr is basically the Romantic novel w/ slightly different set dressing). but yeah, seems like "the native" always has to be dead or dying, even in fiction. :/

From:

conuly

IBR?

Dead and dying is still better than utterly nonexistent, I should think. Maybe. Not sure.

Edited Date: 2018-08-18 08:30 pm (UTC)

From:

ioplokon

LBR (let's be real; this is why serif-fonts exist, I guess lol)

& yeah it's that classic debate of no representation vs bad representation and also the ethics of like "salvage anthropology," I guess? I go back and forth on it. Considering how many sci-fi stories are about "first contact" scenarios tho like, you'd think more writers would be informed about and by native american history and write intentional of the parallels...

From:

conuly

Yes, that's probably why serif-fonts exist, but what does it mean?

:D

Considering how many sci-fi stories are about "first contact" scenarios tho like, you'd think more writers would be informed about and by native american history and write intentional of the parallels...

Ever notice how disproportionately many of those are first contact from the POV of the human spacefarers?

From:

stardreamer

One that's not: the Chanur series by C. J. Cherryh. The human is the sole survivor from a survey group that met a bad end, and he's not the viewpoint character.

From:

conuly

Noted!

From:

thewayne

Awesome series, definitely should be on a sci fi reading list.

When my wife was in grad school, one of the computers she had to use the computer name was Kzin. She complained to the prof and suggested it be renamed Hanni. Prof was fine with that, but the IT people said it wouldn't be easy and couldn't do it.

From:

conuly

What liars they were!

From:

thewayne

Yes and no. Depending on how the network is configured, there can be lots of routing tables and firewall configurations that may need to be addressed, plus computer share names that could change and break links. And this was in the '80s and '90s, when network tools were not as friendly. Speaking as a network and server admin formerly Cisco certified, I can see where they would be hesitant on a large university network like Penn State. It would be trivial to add a new computer to the network named Hanni, but renaming one might not be a simple undertaking, lots of things that would have to be thought about.

From:

archangelbeth

And I'm'a plug my own here: short story "Blackest Before the Dawn" in http://furplanet.com/shop/item.aspx?itemid=664 , first contact, and the only human is in the epilogue. *does the "yaaaas, I did an ALL ALIENS story" boogie*

That said, yeah, soooooo many first contact stories are from the human side.

From:

siderea

Others:

Nor Crystal Tears Alan Dean Foster
Dragon's Egg Robert L. Forward

Worth mention: A Deepness in the Sky Vernor Vinge, which has parallel narratives human and non-human, though serious content warning, very rapey and kinda grimdark; on the flip side, interesting rep of autism.

From:

ioplokon

It means: let's be real!

And yeah that or like, dances w/ wolves - in space!

From:

zyzyly

Kim Stanly Robinson wrote a book called The Years of Salt and Rice, whichtook a completely different approach to Native Americans, where they actually hold on to most of North America. It's not the main focus of the novel, but it's interesting.

From:

conuly

I read that a few years back, but now I've lost my copy.

From:

ioplokon

thank you for the rec, that does sound really interesting! i always like fiction that emphasizes that history is not inevitable (esp irt colonization)

From:

siderea

I rec it too. I'm not sure it does what you want, though, since it's asking questions and posing thought experiments as to what is and is not inevitable in history. So a lot of actual history gets translated/retold in, e.g., Muslim-, Hindu–, Buddhist-, Confusian–dominated cultures.

I have to say, the chapter on the Renaissance (and necessarily one following) is one of the most memorable and emotionally devastating things I've ever read. It's also, to my mind, one of the most daring things I've seen an author do in fiction, taking huge chutzpah, and pulling it off, and has me all impressed. I saved the key quote to my quotes file and refer to it often, though I rarely quote it to others, what with it not having a lot of meaning out of context.

In that part, things get very, very meta, and the author basically dares the reader to try to reject the story as just fiction (which it is), confronting the reader with the fact that actual history was just like what you just read (which it was) – and he does this without ever breaking the frame of the fiction to refer to real history.

From:

ioplokon

Thanks for the added info! That still sounds super-interesting and honestly, isn't it better for the imagination and critical thinking when books are great but also not precisely what we'd like them to be? Definitely going to check it out!

From:

killing_rose

I recommend Rebecca Roanhorse's Trail of Lightning so much. It's right on the cusp, I think, of what some parents are willing to go for and some aren't. (There is, I say wryly, a bit of death and dismemberment, but it's sci-fi/sci-fantasy. It's usually understood that that will be included.) I've seen it referred to as Native American Fury Road and I haven't quite decided how I feel about that description.

What I do love is that there's a Native woman writing Native cast-only books and doing a brilliant job at it. Drawing upon her nation's legends and history. (While my nation has roots that mirror the Dine's and at some point, we evolved from each other, that some point was at least hundreds of years ago if not Significantly More Than That, so I have to play "which of the creation myths is this again" game with the book, but it's not like I don't have to do that with beings who are pulling from Random Pagan Tradition.)

(I am That Person who threw books when disgusted by racism prior to my e-reader. Post e-reader, you will occasionally hear me mutter under my breath "I cannot kill the e-reader. We like the e-reader. I do not want to spend 70 bucks.")

I have a couple of "POC writers/main characters" book reviews to write again, if I ever get my brain screwed on straight again.

From:

conuly

Recommend for me, or for my rec's list? This person has a set of requirements, and I suspect there's too much relationships in here for her kid.

(Interestingly, Trail of Lightning is one of TWO post-apocalyptic books with a NA girl killing monsters I've read in the past few months, the other being Killer of Enemies. Despite the obvious similarities, those books still manage to have wildly different situations.)

From:

killing_rose

More you than the teenager--admittedly, I'd have read this in childhood, but we don't go off of my childhood. (I am also cheerfully reccing it to everyone and anyone because I really, really want more books.)

From:

dragonyphoenix

Hmm, I think I'll check that out. Thanks for the rec!

From:

oracne

Rec seconded!

From:

gatheringrivers

I believe C.S. Friedman is a woman, and writes in the fantasy AND sci-fi end. I don't know if that's the sort of thing that would make your short list?

From:

oracne

I did not know about the Japanese internment/NA connection...more for the reading list, I guess.

From:

magnetic_pole

Would you be willing to share your all-women writer list? My partner is trying to get into sic fi and speculative fiction and wants more women and POC. (She's an adult--er, obviously--but also fond of teen lit.) Thanks either way.

The connection between internment and NAs is so interesting! M.

From:

conuly

It was a short list using some very nitpicky rules - to be honest, I did some cribbing off of google! But I can make a different rec list of teen sci-fi with women and/or nonwhite authors.

From:

magnetic_pole

That would be lovely. She's so frustrated with the stuff she's finding at the library, and yet I'm pretty sure there's a lot of feminist stuff out there--it's just not a topic I know much about.

Whatever you have on hand--even just a few names--would be helpful. Thanks! M.

From:

duskpeterson

Maybe part of the problem she's facing is that "woman author" doesn't necessarily translate into female protagonists, much less feminism. But for teen SF with a female protagonist, she could try Sylvia Engdahl's "Enchantress from the Stars." It won a Newbery Honor.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4580.Enchantress_from_the_Stars

And of course there's always Ursula K. Le Guin.

From:

thewayne

I would definitely like to see your list.

And out of curiosity, did you include Becky Chambers Long Way To A Small And Angry Planet?

From:

conuly

YES.

Though I mentioned that my favorite is Record of a Spaceborn Few.

From:

thewayne

I haven't gotten to that one yet, I look forward to it.

From:

thewayne

Best friend from high school (and still current best friend), his mother was a teacher and had a student ask for a sci fi reading list. Mother didn't know the genre, asked John. John asked me. I compiled quite a list, a good 20-30. Sadly, this was back in probably late '70s/early '80s. I doubt there were many women writers beyond CJ mentioned above.

And I did receive a thank you letter from the student!

From:

conuly

This isn't true. There were tons.

https://www.metafilter.com/175761/Women-SF-Writers-of-the-1970s

From:

thewayne

Based on what I had read and been exposed to at the time. Not having an income of my own and very limited transportation, I didn't get to explore as much as I would have liked. I'm not certain I'd been to any science fiction cons at that time!

I know they were there, it was just my own discovery of them at that time was sorely lacking. My (very young and misguided) perception was that they were mainly 'fantasy' authors, and at that time bookstores frequently has different sections for science fiction and fantasy, something almost unheard of today.

From:

conuly

So you meant you doubted that YOU included women writers on your list, not that they existed at all? Gotcha, I thought you meant the latter.

From:

thewayne

No, entirely on me and my list. Unfortunately it was also before I had a computer (though I kept telling my parents that all I wanted for Christmas was an Apple), so I don't know what was on it.

From:

negothick

Ruthanna Emrys is here on Dreamwidth,but I can't remember her handle. Did no one mention that these are Lovecraft's deep-sea denizens from Shadow over Innsmouth? That Winter Tide is one of the best Lovecraftian deconstructions ever?? It is!

From:

conuly

Maybe so, but not to mention Native Americans at all? that is one hell of an oversight.

From:

negothick

Just trying to clarify the Lovecraft connection. . .there's a sequel, too, which I haven't yet read. Deep Roots--there may be a Native American component in that one.