Emergency Tab Closure Post - 2.9.21

Emergency Tab Closure Post – 2.9.21

My Butler research has had a little bit of a comeback in recent months with the publication of the first Library of America book; it’s been profiled in both the New York Times and Harper’s recently. I also had a nice conversation with New Rural on “Mutual Symbiosis” I hope you’ll check out!Next week I’m giving a talk on 1984. Here’s a…

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Friday Links!

https://twitter.com/gerrycanavan/status/1425839577676255234

I’ll be doing a lecture and seminar series as a virtual scholar-in-residence at The Rosenbach this fall on four of Octavia Butler’s novels. Here are the details! We’re reading Kindred, Wild Seed, Dawn, and Parable of the Sower…Transfer Orbit dives into the latest on The Last Dangerous Visions.In Praise of the Info Dump: A Literary Case…

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11/29 (Additional) Book Deals 

Good morning, everyone! I hope your week is off to a wonderful start! :) 

Apologies for not posting more last week, I was trying to take some time off of the internet and decompress a bit before diving into what is sure to be a rather stressful month. Last week also marked the 15 year anniversary of my dad’s death, so that’s always a weird time for me, as well. I’d love to hear how you all are doing! How’s life? Can you believe it’s already almost December?? How’s your weather?? We’re still getting warm weather here off and on, go figure. 

In regard to the books (which is why we’re all here), there are a ton on sale, so seems like an awesome time to stock up on both new and backlist releases for really great prices if you need to get some more books to read! Also, I will link to and repost my deals post from last week because I’m pretty sure those are also still on sale, so lots of options. :) The Book of Koli is one I always recommend, and I’ve really enjoyed books by H.G. Parry! Also, I haven’t read them, but the entire Cursebreaker series (A Curse so Dark and Lonely, etc.) is on sale as a bundle, so if you’ve been wanting to read that it seems like a really good deal! There are just basically a lot of awesome books available to choose from, including some super new releases, as well as some really popular backlist titles (like The Fifth Season!), so definitely have a look. :)

Anyway, I hope you all have a truly wonderful day, and happy reading to all!

Today’s Deals:

• The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah- https://amzn.to/319eZRK
• The Rose Code by Kate Quinn- https://amzn.to/3E8hpi2
• The Sweetness of Water by Nathan Harris - https://amzn.to/3d24VfH
• The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin- https://amzn.to/2ZxzOFI
• New Spring by Robert Jordan- https://amzn.to/3xzk01L
• The Exiles by Christina Baker Kline- https://amzn.to/3o2qMKo
• The Hunting Party by Lucy Foley- https://amzn.to/3rgZuBV
• The Only Woman in the Room by Marie Benedict- https://amzn.to/3FVhEgL
• Seven Days in June by Tia Williams- https://amzn.to/3D3jWsu
• My Dark Vanessa by Kate Elizabeth Russell- https://amzn.to/3D2gL4g
• Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow by Yuval Noah Harari- https://amzn.to/3xDhism
• The Things We Cannot Say by Kelly Rimmer- https://amzn.to/3FYoEta
• Good Company by Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney- https://amzn.to/3FWGOeT
• Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler- https://amzn.to/3d1pA3K
• Snowby John Banville- https://amzn.to/2ZAvOEt
• The Galaxy, and the Ground Within by Becky Chambers- https://amzn.to/3FViDgX
• The Best of Me by David Sedaris- https://amzn.to/3I2M8z8
• Life, Unscheduled by Kristin Rockaway- https://amzn.to/3xB2URh
• Island Queen by Vanessa Riley- https://amzn.to/3xy3rU7
• Appleseedby Matt Bell- https://amzn.to/3GdDcFJ
• Incense and Sensibility by Sonali Dev- https://amzn.to/3E4ucSB
• The Icepick Surgeon: Murder, Fraud, Sabotage, PIracy, and Other Dastardly Deeds Perpetrated in the Name of Science by Sam Kean - https://amzn.to/3D5qBCr 
• Outlawed by Anna North-  https://amzn.to/3pdyAZ2
• Capture the Crown by Jennifer Estep- https://amzn.to/3cXYNFt
• Boundless(Drizzt) by R.A. Salvatore- https://amzn.to/3lfvhiL
• Her Heart for a Compass by Sarah Ferguson- https://amzn.to/3lisHJ9
• A Happy Catastrophe by Maddie Dawson- https://amzn.to/31acSgE
• The Bennet Women by Eden Appiah-Kubi- https://amzn.to/3E5Thwo
• The Last Story of Mina Lee by Nancy Jooyoun Kim- https://amzn.to/3pblWtF
• The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery & Alison Anderson- https://amzn.to/31ad9jG
• Land: How the Hunger for Ownership Shaped the Modern World by Simon Winchester- https://amzn.to/3rkPnfI
• Medium Raw by Anthony Bourdain- https://amzn.to/3E5qxns
• The Book of Koli by M.R. Carey -  https://amzn.to/31aLdMa
• A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians by H.G. Parry - https://amzn.to/3o3BWi8
• The Kingdoms by Natasha Pulley- https://amzn.to/3lkP5Br
• The Rehearsals by Annette Christie-  https://amzn.to/3cWj3r0
• A Touch of Jen by Beth Morgan- https://amzn.to/3o3n2Zd
• Brave New World by Aldous Huxley- https://amzn.to/3p7Oog1
• Snare (Reykjavik Noir Trilogy) by Lilja Sigurdardottir- https://amzn.to/32JWB2s
• An Unnecessary Woman by Rabig Alameddine- https://amzn.to/3FYSJZA
• Hot Stew by Fiona Mozley - https://amzn.to/3D5mGFI
• The Cat Proposed by Dento Hayane - https://amzn.to/31dnmeY
• Would You Like to Be a Family? by Koyama- https://amzn.to/3liYKZl
• The Cursebreaker Series (all three books!) by Brigid Kemmerer - https://amzn.to/3liOiRM
• Who They Was by Gabriel Krauze- https://amzn.to/2ZyTUPY
• Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls: 100 Immigrant Women Who Changed the World by Elena Favilli- https://amzn.to/316a44i
• The Essential Chomsky by Noam Chomsky - https://amzn.to/3DguOU1
• You’ll Never Believe What Happened to Lacey: Crazy Stories About Racism by Amber Ruffin & Lacey Lamar- https://amzn.to/3p4VIJg
  
• Mind of My Mind by Octavia E. Butler- https://amzn.to/3E7hH8y
  

NOTE:  I am categorizing these book deals posts under the tag #bookdeals, so if you don’t want to see them then just block that tag and you should be good. I am an Amazon affiliate and will receive a small (but very much needed!)  commission on any purchase made through these links. If you’d rather shop at other bookstores, I am also a Bookshop.organdIndieboundaffiliate! :)

Octavia Butler: “[T]he one thing that I and my main characters never do when contemplating the future is give up hope. In fact, the very act of trying to look ahead to discern possibilities and offer warnings is in itself an act of hope.”

A Few Rules For Predicting The Future by Octavia E. Butler

Back in the spring, I read and did a critical comparative analysis on both Cressida J. Heyes’ Self-Transformations: Foucault, Ethics, and Normalized Bodies, and Dr. Sami Schalk’s BODYMINDS REIMAGINED: (Dis)ability, Race, and Gender in Black Women’s Speculative Fiction. Each of these texts aims to explore conceptions of modes of embodied being, and the ways the exterior pressure of societal norms impacts what are seen as “normal” or “acceptable” bodies.

For Heyes, that exploration takes the form of three case studies: The hermeneutics of transgender individuals, especially trans women; the “Askeses” (self-discipline practices) of organized weight loss dieting programs; and “Attempts to represent the subjectivity of cosmetic surgery patients.” Schalk’s site of interrogation is Black women speculative fiction authors and the ways in which their writing illuminates new understandings of race, gender, and what Schalk terms “(dis)ability.

Both Heyes and Schalk focus on popular culture and they both center gender as a valence of investigation because the embodied experience of women in western society is the crux point for multiple intersecting pressures.

Read the rest of Bodyminds, Self-Transformations, and Situated SelfhoodatTechnoccult

Octavia Butler was a visionary storyteller who upended science fiction, built stunning worlds throughout her work, and explored dilemmas that keep us awake at night.

Born in 1947, Octavia Butler grew up shy and introvertedin Pasadena, California. She dreamt up stories from an early age, and was soon scribbling these scenarios on paper. At twelve, she begged her mother for a typewriter after enduring a campy science fiction film called Devil Girl From Mars.Unimpressed with what she saw, Butler knew she could tell a better story.

Much science fiction features white male heroes who blast aliens or become saviors of brown people. Butler wanted to write diverse characters for diverse audiences. She brought nuance and depth to the representation of their experiences.  

For Butler, imagination was not only for planting the seeds of science fiction - but also a strategy for surviving an unjust world on one’s own terms. Her work often takes troubling features of the world such as discrimination on the basis of race, gender, class, or ability, and invites the reader to contemplate them in new contexts.

One of her most beloved novels, the Parable of the Sower, follows this pattern. It tells the story of Lauren Oya Olamina as she makes her way through a near future California ruined by corporate greed, inequality, and environmental destruction. As she struggles with hyperempathy, or a condition in the novel that causes her to feel others’ pain and less often their pleasure, Lauren embarks on a quest with a group of refugees to find a place to thrive. 

Lauren’s quest had roots in a real life event – California Prop 187, which attempted to deny undocumented immigrants fundamental human rights, before it was deemed unconstitutional. Butler frequently incorporated contemporary news into her writing. In her 1998 sequel to The Parable of the Sower,Parable of the Talents, she wrote of a presidential candidate who controls Americans with virtual reality and “shock collars.” His slogan? “Make America great again.”

While people have noted her prescience, Butler was also interested in re-examining history. For instance, Kindredtells the story of a woman who is repeatedly pulled back in time to the Maryland plantation of her ancestors. Early on, she learns that her mission is to save the life of the white man who will rape her great grandmother. If she doesn’t save him, she herself will cease to exist. This grim dilemma forces Dana to confront the ongoing trauma of slavery and sexual violence against Black women.

With her stories of women founding new societies, time travelers overcoming historical strife, and interspecies bonding, Butler had a profound influence on the growing popularity of Afrofuturism. That’s a cultural movement where Black writers and artists who are inspired by the past, present, and future produce works that incorporate magic, history, technology and much more.

And today, Butler’s work remains a powerful reminder that imagination can be a tool for real change – as well as a rallying call for those who seek other ways to live in the world.

This month, TED-Ed is celebrating Black History Month, or National African American History Month, an annual celebration of achievements by black Americans and a time for recognizing the central role of African Americans in U.S. history.

From the TED-Ed Lesson Why should you read sci-fi superstar Octavia E. Butler? - Ayana Jamieson and Moya Bailey

Animation by Tomás Pichardo-Espaillat