Midnight Robber by Nalo Hopkinson- 2000 - 331 pages
This is the third book by Nalo Hopkinson I have had the great pleasure of reading. She is one of the most influential writers of Science Fiction works in the world now.
In October I read The Salt Roads by Nalo Hopkinson. I was very much shocked by the depth of this work dealing deeply with the consequences of slavery through several centuries.
From my post on The Salt Roads
“So far this year I have been stunned by the depth and Beauty of two novels by writers hithertonow unread by me. The first was The Master and Margarita by Michail Bulgakov. The Salt Roads is my second such work. By Nalo Hopkinson is just amazing beyond my powers to describe how I feel about it.”
Start your reading of Nalo Hopkinson with The Salt Roads.
Last month I read her from 1998, Brown Girl in the Ring. Brown Girl in the Ring, Nalo Hopkinson’s first novel, lived up to my very high expectations. Set in a dystopian future Toronto where the central city has been largely abandoned by white residents escaping to the outer fringes of the huge city. Inner City Toronto is a place of hopelessness, extreme
poverty and a constant threat of violence. The central characters In Brown Girl in The Ring are the descendants of African slaves of Caribbean background.
Midnight Robber is set several hundred years in the future. Descendants of enslaved persons of Afro-Carib ancestry have left earth, now nearly inhabitable, colonizing a new planet. Like Brown Girl in the Ring the first person narrative in Midnight Robber is in a future patois derived partially from Afro-Carib heritage modified by hundreds of years on an alien planet. The language,once you accept the rhythm, is a joy.
On planet Toussaint everyone is connected to the Grande Nanotech Sentient Interface at all times, from birth, via nanomites implanted in their ears. The narrator, Tan-Tan, who we first meet at age nine, is the daughter of Antonio, mayor of one of the towns. In a fit of jealousy in a duel which meant to forbid killing, murders his rival through drugging him. He along with Tan-Tan is transported to New Half Way Tree, a primitive place with many dangers, as a punishment. Hopkinson is a genius at creating fascinating fictional worlds with true depth. I do not want to divulge what happens to much to Antonio and Tan-Tan on New Half Way Tree but it is exciting and shocking. We see Tan-Tan grow in maturity as she copes with her new home and her growth into a young woman. There are lots of wonderfully realized characters, human and otherwise on New Half Way Tree. It is very much an arboreal environment. The aboriginal inhabitants are very bonded with their daddy tree.
I found this book fascinating. I will hopefully keep reading on in Hopkinson’s work.
My prior posts have bio data on Hopkinson
So you'd say The Salt Roads is still your favourite? I'm not sure if I could choose, because I should probably reread them all, but I tend to think of Midnight Robber as my favourite. Could also be because, at that point, I'd read very little Afro-Caribbean fantasy, so it was new and fresh and riveting.
ReplyDeleteBuried in Print. I think The Salt Roads is a powerful account of the nature of racism and slavery and if someone reads only one Hopkinson that should be it. Maybe Midnight Robber is more fun with the amazing world it creates .
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