Binti (novella)

Last updated
Binti
Binti - book cover.jpg
Paperback edition
Author Nnedi Okorafor
CountryNigeria
LanguageEnglish
Series Binti Trilogy
Genre(s) Science fiction, Horror
Publisher Tor Books
Pages96
Awards Hugo Award for Best Novella
Nebula Award for Best Novella
Nommo Award for Best Novella
ISBN978-0-7653-8525-3
Publication date2015
Followed by Binti: Home

Binti is an Africanfuturist science fiction novella by Nigerian American writer Nnedi Okorafor. [1] [2] The novella was published in 2015 by Tor.com. Binti is the first novella in Okorafor's Binti novella series. [3]

Contents

Binti won multiple prominent literary awards, including the Hugo Award for Best Novella and the Nebula Award for Best Novella. [1] [4] A television adaptation is reportedly under development at Hulu. [5]

Plot

A young woman named Binti is the first member of the Himba people from Earth to be accepted into the prestigious intergalactic university Oomza Uni. Upon being notified of her acceptance, Binti runs away from home and boards a transport ship to Oomza Uni. While in transit, the ship is hijacked by the Meduse, a jellyfish-like alien species that was previously at war with the Khoush, another human ethnic group. After the Meduse murder all other inhabitants of the ship, Binti retreats into her private living quarters. She subsequently discovers that a piece of ancient technology she had brought with her from Earth, referred to as her edan, enables direct communication with the Meduse, and that her otjize , a type of mixed clay made from the soil of her homeland, has healing properties when applied to the tentacles of the Meduse. She makes a friend in one of the younger, more hot-headed Meduse, named Okwu, and subsequently brokers a tentative truce between herself and the hijacker; the truce entails Binti's profound physical transformation. Upon arrival at the university, she is able to negotiate a short lasting peace between the Meduse and the human race, after which she begins her studies at Oomza Uni in earnest. [6]

Awards and nominations

Sequels

The novella has 3 sequels. [3] The first, Binti: Home , was released on January 31, 2017. [13] The third installment, Binti: The Night Masquerade , was released in January 2018. [14] [15] Subsequently, DAW/Penguin/PRH published an omnibus edition of the three novellas with an additional short story titled "Binti: Sacred Fire", [16] which serves as an interlude between Binti and Home. [17] [18]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ian McDonald (British author)</span> British science fiction novelist

Ian McDonald is a British science fiction novelist, living in Belfast. His themes include nanotechnology, postcyberpunk settings, and the impact of rapid social and technological change on non-Western societies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nnedi Okorafor</span> Nigerian-American writer of science fiction and fantasy (born 1974)

Nnedimma Nkemdili "Nnedi" Okorafor is a Nigerian American writer of science fiction and fantasy for both children and adults. She is best known for her Binti Series and her novels Who Fears Death, Zahrah the Windseeker, Akata Witch, Akata Warrior, Lagoon and Remote Control. She has also written for comics and film.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Martha Wells</span> American speculative fiction writer (born 1964)

Martha Wells is an American writer of speculative fiction. She has published a number of fantasy novels, young adult novels, media tie-ins, short stories, and nonfiction essays on fantasy and science fiction subjects. Her novels have been translated into twelve languages. Wells has won four Hugo Awards, two Nebula Awards and three Locus Awards for her science fiction series The Murderbot Diaries. She is also known for her fantasy series Ile-Rien and The Books of the Raksura. Wells is praised for the complex, realistically detailed societies she creates; this is often credited to her academic background in anthropology.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aliette de Bodard</span> French-American speculative fiction writer

Aliette de Bodard is a French-American speculative fiction writer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ken Liu</span> Chinese-American writer

Ken Liu is an American author of science fiction and fantasy. Liu has won multiple Hugo and Nebula Awards for his novel translations and original short fiction, which has appeared in F&SF, Asimov's Science Fiction, Analog, Lightspeed, Clarkesworld, and multiple "Year's Best" anthologies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ann Leckie</span> American science fiction author (born 1966)

Ann Leckie is an American author of science fiction and fantasy. Her 2013 debut novel Ancillary Justice, which features artificial consciousness and gender-blindness, won the 2014 Hugo Award for "Best Novel", as well as the Nebula Award, the Arthur C. Clarke Award, and the BSFA Award. The sequels, Ancillary Sword and Ancillary Mercy, each won the Locus Award and were nominated for the Nebula Award. Provenance, published in 2017, and Translation State, published in 2023, are also set in the Imperial Radch universe. Leckie's first fantasy novel, The Raven Tower, was published in February 2019.

This is a list of the published works of Aliette de Bodard.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Amal El-Mohtar</span> Canadian poet and writer (born 1984)

Amal El-Mohtar is a Canadian poet and writer of speculative fiction. She is the editor of Goblin Fruit and reviews science fiction and fantasy books for the New York Times Book Review and is best known for the 2019 novella This Is How You Lose the Time War, co-written with Max Gladstone, which won the 2019 Nebula Award for Best Novella, the 2020 Locus Award for Best Novella, the 2020 Hugo Award for Best Novella, and several other awards.

<i>Binti: Home</i> 2017 science fiction novella by Nnedi Okorafor

Binti: Home is a 2017 science fiction novella written by Nnedi Okorafor and published by Tor.com. Binti: Home is the sequel to Okorafor's Binti from 2015, and is followed by Binti: The Night Masquerade, published in 2018.

Alix E. Harrow is an American science fiction and fantasy writer. Her short fiction work "A Witch's Guide to Escape: A Practical Compendium of Portal Fantasies" has been nominated for the Nebula Award, World Fantasy Award, and Locus Award, and in 2019 won a Hugo Award. Her debut novel, The Ten Thousand Doors of January (2019), was widely acclaimed by mainstream critics, lauded by general audiences during voting at Goodreads Choice Awards and Locus Awards, and nominated for multiple first novel literary awards and speculative fiction awards. She has also published under the name Alix Heintzman.

Dexter Gabriel, better known by his pen name Phenderson Djèlí Clark, is an American speculative fiction writer and historian, who is an assistant professor in the department of history at the University of Connecticut. He uses a pen name to differentiate his literary work from his academic work, and has also published under the name A. Phenderson Clark. This pen name, "Djèlí", makes reference to the griots – traditional Western African storytellers, historians and poets.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tamsyn Muir</span> New Zealand writer (born 1985)

Tamsyn Elizabeth Muir is a New Zealand fantasy, science fiction, and horror author best known for The Locked Tomb, a science fantasy series of novels. Muir won the 2020 Locus Award for her first novel, Gideon the Ninth, and has been nominated for several other awards as well.

<i>Binti: The Night Masquerade</i> 2018 science fiction novella by Nnedi Okorafor

Binti: The Night Masquerade is a science fiction novella written by Nnedi Okorafor. The novella was published in 2018 by Tor.com, and it is the final novella in the Binti trilogy that began with 2015's Binti and 2017's Binti: Home. When the full collection Binti: The Complete Trilogy was published, Okorafor added another short story titled "Binti: Sacred Fire".

Africanfuturism is a cultural aesthetic and philosophy of science that centers on the fusion of African culture, history, mythology, point of view, with technology based in Africa and not limiting to the diaspora. It was coined by Nigerian American writer Nnedi Okorafor in 2019 in a blog post as a single word. Nnedi Okorafor defines Africanfuturism as a sub-category of science fiction that is "directly rooted in African culture, history, mythology and point-of-view..and...does not privilege or center the West," is centered with optimistic "visions in the future," and is written by "people of African descent" while rooted in the African continent. As such its center is African, often does extend upon the continent of Africa, and includes the Black diaspora, including fantasy that is set in the future, making a narrative "more science fiction than fantasy" and typically has mystical elements. It is different from Afrofuturism, which focuses mainly on the African diaspora, particularly the United States. Works of Africanfuturism include science fiction, fantasy, alternate history, horror and magic realism.

<i>Remote Control</i> (novella) 2021 novella by Nnedi Okorafor

Remote Control is a 2021 science fiction novella by Nigerian American Nnedi Okorafor. It is Okorafor's first novella after the Binti Trilogy and is set in the same universe as Okorafor's Who Fears Death and The Book of Phoenix.

Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki is a Nigerian speculative fiction writer, editor and publisher who was the first African-born Black author to win a Nebula Award. He has also received a World Fantasy Award, British Fantasy Award, Otherwise Award, and two Nommo Awards, along with being a multi-time finalist for a number of other honors, including the Hugo Award.

<i>Riot Baby</i> 2020 adult novella by Tochi Onyebuchi

Riot Baby is a science fiction novella written by Nigerian American author Tochi Onyebuchi published in 2020.

The Binti trilogy or Binti Series is a trilogy of Africanfuturist science fiction novellas by Nigerian American author Nnedi Okorafor. Beginning with Binti and ending with Binti: The Night Masquerade, it follows the heroine Binti as she leaves Earth to attend a prestigious university in space.

Ife-Iyoku, the Tale of Imadeyunuagbon is a fantasy novella by Nigerian speculative fiction writer Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki. It was first published Selene Quarterly in August 2019, and republished in Dominion: An Anthology of Speculative Fiction From Africa and the African Diaspora anthology which was published by Aurelia Leo in 2020. The novella received critical reviews.

<i>Dominion: An Anthology of Speculative Fiction From Africa and the African Diaspora</i> 2020 speculative fiction anthology

Dominion: An Anthology of Speculative Fiction From Africa and the African Diaspora is a 2020 speculative fiction anthology edited by Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki and Zelda Knight. It contains thirteen works of short fiction, and a foreword by Tananarive Due. It was first published by Aurelia Leo in 2020.

References

  1. 1 2 Barnett, David (21 August 2016). "Hugo awards see off rightwing protests to celebrate diverse authors". The Guardian .
  2. ↑ Pilling, David (February 16, 2021). "Africanfuturism is partly an attempt to grapple with the past". Financial Times . Archived from the original on February 25, 2021. Retrieved February 25, 2021.
  3. 1 2 Harris, Lee (27 April 2016). "Nnedi Okorafor Pens Two More Binti Tales". Tor.com. Retrieved 2016-12-02.
  4. 1 2 "Nebula Award Winners Announced". Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. 2016.
  5. ↑ "'Binti' Adaptation From Michael Ellenberg in the Works at Hulu (Exclusive)". The Hollywood Reporter. 14 January 2020.
  6. ↑ Okorafor, Nnedi (2015). Binti. Tor.com. ISBN   978-0765385253. Excerpt available at Tor.com.
  7. ↑ "2016 Hugo Awards Announced". The Hugo Awards. 2016-08-21. Retrieved 2017-02-08.
  8. ↑ "BooktubeSFF Awards". booktubesffawards.tumblr.com. Retrieved 2017-02-08.
  9. ↑ "BSFA Awards 2015 Shortlist announced". BSFA - The official website of the British Science Fiction Association. 2016-02-08. Archived from the original on 2017-02-21. Retrieved 2017-02-08.
  10. ↑ "Announcing the 2016 British Fantasy Award Winners". Tor.com. 2016-09-26. Retrieved 2017-02-08.
  11. ↑ Publications, Locus (3 May 2016). "Locus Online News » 2016 Locus Awards Finalists". www.locusmag.com. Retrieved 2017-02-08.
  12. ↑ "Announcing the 2017 Nommo Award Winners". Tor.com . November 16, 2017.
  13. ↑ "Binti: Home". Tor.com. 2017-01-24. Retrieved 2017-03-14.
  14. ↑ "Binti: The Night Masquerade | Nnedi Okorafor | Macmillan". US Macmillan. Retrieved 2017-03-14.
  15. ↑ "Hugo Finalists for 2019" . Retrieved 2 April 2019.
  16. ↑ Lapointe, Annette. "A book review by Annette Lapointe: Binti: The Complete Trilogy". New York Journal of Books. Retrieved 2020-08-03.
  17. ↑ Jones, Tadiana; Capossere, Bill; Nyman, Jana (February 8, 2019). "BINTI: The Complete Trilogy: Diverse opinions for a story of diversity | Fantasy Literature: Fantasy and Science Fiction Book and Audiobook Reviews". fantasyliterature.com.
  18. ↑ "Why You Need to Read: "Binti: The Complete Trilogy"". aquavenatus. February 6, 2019.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.