Riot Baby by Tochi Onyebuchi
Feb. 10th, 2020 12:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lightreadsRiot Baby
3+/5. Novella about two black siblings, one with powers of prognostication and other magic, and the other making his awful way through the prison system. This book begins with the L.A. riots and ends in a very near future where prisoners are released with an embedded mood stabilizing chip. It's exploring the premise that a lot of specfic has gone after recently – that the experience of being black in America is the experience of dystopia. It's also about racism by malice and racism by indifference, and having the power to change things, but maybe too much. I think it is all a bit underbaked, as various pieces of this story dangle in the direction of each other without quite connecting, but it's good and interesting nonetheless.
Content notes: Police brutality, stillbirth, prison, suicidal ideation.
3+/5. Novella about two black siblings, one with powers of prognostication and other magic, and the other making his awful way through the prison system. This book begins with the L.A. riots and ends in a very near future where prisoners are released with an embedded mood stabilizing chip. It's exploring the premise that a lot of specfic has gone after recently – that the experience of being black in America is the experience of dystopia. It's also about racism by malice and racism by indifference, and having the power to change things, but maybe too much. I think it is all a bit underbaked, as various pieces of this story dangle in the direction of each other without quite connecting, but it's good and interesting nonetheless.
Content notes: Police brutality, stillbirth, prison, suicidal ideation.