New Suns is a forthcoming speculative fiction anthology edited by the great Nisi Shawl. I was able to acquire and read an advance copy, thanks to Netgalley. This book contains short stories by writers of color. Some of the writers are already well known to me, while in other cases this was my first introduction to their work. The anthology reflects the fact that so much of the most dynamic and powerful speculative fiction at this point in time is being written by people of color. The writers in this anthology radically revise familiar traditions, both western and other. They do what speculative fiction, whether future-oriented (science fiction) or past-oriented (fantasy fiction) at its best generally does: suggest alternatives that speak to our possibility of survival in a world currently ravaged by neoliberal capitalism, with its racism and its assault on the environment.
I cannot write about all the stories individually in this comment, but I will mention the ones I particularly loved. Tobias Buckell’s “Galactic Tourist Industrial Complex” gives a satirical and very funny description of a future in which the entire Earth has become a backwater that subsists entirely on tourism from wealthier and more technologically powerful species from other planets. This story brings home post-colonial dependency to American readers who might well themselves be on the other side of the equation (as tourists in poorer countries themselves). Kathleen Alcala’s “Deer Dancer” shows how indigenous ways might give the best hope for survival in a decayed post-climate-catastrophe landscape. Minsoo Kang’s “The Virtue of Unfaithful Translations” is a witty parable about surviving the stupidity of the powerful, and about the limitations of scholarly and historical reconstruction, in an Asian-based fantasy world. Steven Barnes’ Come Home to Atropos goes along well with Buckell’s story, as it is a sarcastic take on the tourist economy of poorer, post-colonial countries seeking to attract dollars from the affluent white world; in this story, even suicide becomes a fancy and “exotic” experience. Jaymee Goh’s “The Freedom of the Shifting Sea” brilliantly rewrites the mermaid tale in terms both of white/Asian colonial relations, and of some rather unusual (but actual) facts of biology. Lily Yu’s “Three Variations on a Theme of Imperial Attire” sarcastically rings a number of social and political changes on Hans Christian Anderson’s tale of The Emperor’s New Clothes. Those are my favorites, but in fact all the stories in this anthology are really good.