Nnedi Okorafor
(Cincinnati)
“You are the pride of your people,” young Binti is told by a security guard after he scans her astrolabe and sees the rest of her life.
Binti (2015) is the first book in Nnedi Okorafor’s Binti trilogy of novellas following the intergalactic exploits of Binti, an ethnic Himbi student at the prestigious “off-world” Oomza University. Binti earned bother the Nebula and Hugo Awards for best novella in 2016.
Okorafor has written numerous other books including Binti: Home (2017), Binti: The Night Masquerade (2018), and Akata Warrior (2017).
Okorafor has described her writing as Africanjujuism, a word she coined, which she defines as “a subcategory of fantasy that respectfully acknowledges the seamless blend of true existing African spiritualities and cosmologies with the imaginative.”
If you enjoyed Binti, we suggest these Ohio side trips:
- Ernest Kline’s Ready Player One
- Jeffrey Ford’s The Fantasy Writer’s Assistant: And Other Stories
- Alison Stine’s Road Out of Winter