elle oh elle

Check out this diagram from ResearchGate.  It deals with the color vision of horses, who are also generally dichromatic.  (I think, though I’m not sure, that zebras would have the same color vision as horses.)  See how orange and green look to them?

or how about a leopard?

It’s called ‘disruptive colouration’ because the markings help to break up the animal’s outline against the grasses or rocks. And the rosettes on leopards and jaguars? Sun spots shining through the trees and leaves on the ground.

it has been remarked by some that a hobbit’s only real passion

is for food

a wizard is never late

My boss pointed out the security concern, but she wasn’t taken seriously, so she took matters into her own hands. 

She bought a ticket and  pretended to be a guest. She entered through the main entrance with a huge drill clearly visible on her belt, went straight to the documents and opened the case with the drill. (While  wearing gloves,) she removed the documents, put them in a folder, reattached the glass, and walked out the main exit.  Literally no one even questioned her.

 She immediately went around to the back of the museum, entered using the staff entrance and went straight to her boss’s office.  She dropped the folder on his desk and said “I just stole these in 15 minutes“

An Unkindness of Ghosts, my debut novel about a young (disabled, intersex, lesbian/queer) Black woman living in the slums of a generation ship, came out October 2017.

I’ve been really honored by the overwhelmingly positive response; however, I wanted to do a little bit of book-related outreach, to make sure anyone who might be interested in Unkindness has at least heard of it! So this is my little masterlist post of all the reasons you might want to buy this book or pick it up from your library! tl;dr, it’s gay as shit. 

1) Okay, so it feels decidedly notgood to me to simplify complex social locations into a laundry list of identities, but I do think Unkindness will speak to folks looking for books exploring the following topics & experiences: 

- being trans, nonbinary, genderweird, genderantagonistic, gendertraumatized - being a dyke, dykegender, loving women, wanting women - being autistic, adhd, psychotic, “not otherwise specified,” borderline, PTSD - being a descendant of the Trans Atlantic Slave Trade, a refugee, & diasporan

2) A lot of folks have had nothing but kind things to say, and here’s a little blurb that gives you a better idea about what An Unkindness of Ghosts is actually about.

“Solomon’s big, unflinching and poetically detailed sci-fi debut tells the story of Aster Grey, an orphan raised on the slavery deck of a starship called the HSS Matilda as she searches for answers to her mother’s death and the mystery of the forces who control the starship. Aster is both neuroatypical and queer, and these elements of her characterization work seamlessly and nonexploitatively into a plot that mirrors so many of our own world’s greatest injustices, probing at our ideas about classism, racism, abuse and tyranny. A stunning first novel by a writer I can’t wait to see more from.”

Amal El-Mohtar’s stellar review in NPR said of the book:

What Solomon achieves with this debut — the sharpness, the depth, the precision — puts me in mind of a syringe full of stars. I want to say about this book, its only imperfection is that it ended.

It’s been favorably reviewed on several blogs and other venues as well!

3) It made more end-of-year lists that I can count, including  NPR’s Best Books of 2017,  Publisher’s Weekly Best Books of 2017, The Guardian’s Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of 2017, & Them’s Best Queer Books of 2017. It’s also been featured as a part of Paste Magazine’s Best Audiobooks 2017, Buzzfeed, Elle UK, Shondaland, and Bustle, among others.

You can read an interview with me, the author (Rivers Solomon) about the book at The Rumpus: Magical Systems and Fusion Reactors, and you  can read an excerpt in the Rumpus here.

It was also named as an honour book for the ALA Stonewall Award.