That said, even with all that is fun and thoughtful in the tale, Jemison’s fifth Hugo nomination for best novel, The City We Became, is not a story that resonated with me. While Jemisin is clearly a lover of story and a great reader, in all of her work there is a unique energy for a new age. Then Jemisin, in the tradition of Octavia Butler’s inversive perspective, applies her very own broad and diverse world-building and character-building capabilities to a story of immediacy and cultural relevance. She combines the imagistic capacity of William Gibson with Ray Bradbury’s experimental tendencies. I am definitely an admirer of Jemisin’s work as a world-builder and character-centred prose writer. Whether or not she is officially part of “Octavia’s Brood”-the dynamic collection of social justice-oriented sf stories by Walidah Imarisha and adrienne maree brown-Jemisin is one of the more prolific of the Black women authors who resonate with Butler’s work, including Tananarive Due, Nalo Hopkinson, Nisi Shawl, and one of my favourites, Nnedi Okorafor. With her triple Hugo Award-winning Broken Earth series-the only author to have an entire trilogy win, the only author to win three years in a row, and one of only five writers who have three or more wins-Jemisin may already be there. Clarke, Isaac Asimov, Frank Herbert, Ursula K. Time will tell if she will stand with the all-time greats, like H.G. Jemisin is clearly one of the science fiction greats of the generation.
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