The Lamentation of Their Women, by Kai Ashante Wilson

The Lamentation of Their Women by Kai Ashante Wilson

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


OK, so I'm not exactly sure what to say here. I think the Goodreads summary is misleading--the Devil never appears in the story, and it's the protagonist 'Nisha who tells us that the weapons in the story are from the Prince of Darkness (that phrase also does not appear). It's an extremely well written revenge fantasy, with the deliciousness of the violence front and center and the way the Devil will twist it and the price to be paid later in the background. Probably gets the Sad Puppies and the rest of the Fox News crowd all in a twist, but it was nominated for the Locus Award rather than the Hugo, so may not be on their radar. Good stuff, actually, in its horrific way--Wilson is making it as clear as he can how we got to where we are.



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A Taste of Honey, by Kai Ashante Wilson

A Taste of Honey is Kai Ashante Wilson's second story set in his Sorcerer of the Wildeeps universe.  Goodreads readers rate it as a better book than the first, and I tend to agree.  It's a much richer story.

It starts out as a sort of straight up gay romance.  We have a powerful, masculine warrior seducing an effeminate, closeted boy of royal blood.  But as we go along the story gets more complex.  Aqib, the effete prince, is physically weak but discovers a power in his voice--his words have influence.  He moves on from this early affair to marry and sire a daughter of great power.  He matures into a man of wisdom, strongly supportive of his wife and daughter "witches".  We see hints of how the "magic" is based in very advanced science and literacy, which here is viewed as "women's work". 

The story of the initial seduction and the prince's subsequent life are interwoven, and contrast well.  The writing is beautiful, just like the first book, but with more variety so it's even more interesting to read.  I think this one will be a strong contender in the Nebula novella category this year, and I give it 4 stars.

The Sorcerer of the Wildeeps, by Kai Ashante Wilson

I have enjoyed reading Kai Ashante Wilson's works before, and very much enjoyed this one.  What stood out for me was it's very conscious literary beauty.

Our protagonist is Demane, a distant descendant of the gods, who still has quite a lot more going for him than the average person.  He is in love with another of his kind, Isa, the Captain of the mercenary band that will guard a trading caravan going through the Wildeeps.  They shepherd a band of brothers that have bonded deeply through their life and combat together.  The focus of the story and the beautiful prose is those relationships, though there's plenty of action, particularly at the end.

The book manages to strongly celebrate gay relationships, including the sexuality, without getting explicit.  Also, Wilson attempts to ground the magic in science, though it comes of pseudoscientific in places. 

This is a catch up item for me, the second in the series, "A Taste of Honey", is nominated in the Novella category this year.  We'll see how this holds up.  I give this one a strong three stars.

The Devil In America, by Kai Ashante Wilson

The Devil In America is the last of the Nebula nominated novelettes for this blog, this year.  And another one to make the Sad Puppies cringe, since it centers on racial injustice.  And of course the talk radio induced blindness would miss an important point--this is a story told from a different point of view within a different point of view, and is well worth a critique.

Our protagonist is Easter, a southern black girl growing up in a relatively well off black family.  The story is rich with family life, and centers on a very strong maternal character.  Ma'am has married a man much younger than herself, which makes her something of the talk of the town, though Easter certainly thinks she is deserving.  But Ma'am has had a very hard life, losing two of her three children--Easter is all she has left. 

And the reason behind this loss is power.  The Old African magic, going down through her bloodline but now not well controlled.  As Ma'am puts it, the family is rich but can't count--so they are vulnerable to getting swindled if they use their magical wealth.

But they still do, a little--to keep their famous tobacco healthy--and Easter definitely has the power, seeing the angels all around her.  And they will help her out, too, but she has to be careful.  Except that one time, already past when we enter the tale.

The story is told with interludes that appear to come from the writer's father, referring to the ongoing persecution of black people in America.  He is reading Wilson's tale of Easter and Rosedale, the black community they live in which was attacked and burned by whites in 1877.  One gets the impression that Wilson is tracing this persecution back to the supernatural events of this story.  Not too purely, of course, because the persecution started well before then, but maybe added to it?  Hard to say.

In any case it's quite well written and worth the time to read.  3 stars from me.

Now, which was my favorite novelette from this crop?  I would say it is between Tom Crosshill's The Magician and Laplace's Demon and this one.   It's a narrow thing, but I'd give the award to Crosshill.  We'll see how it comes out.