Finna (novella)

Last updated
Finna
Finna by Nino Cipri.jpg
Cover art for "Finna" by Nino Cipri
Author Nino Cipri
LanguageEnglish
SeriesLitenVerse
Release number
1
Genre Fantasy
Publisher Tor.com
Publication date
25 February 2020
Pages136 (Paperback)
ISBN 1250245737
Followed byDefekt 

Finna is a 2020 LGBT fantasy novella by Nino Cipri. It has been praised for its inclusion of queer characters and its criticism of capitalism and retail work. It was nominated for the 2021 Hugo Award for Best Novella, the 2021 Locus Award for Best Novella, and the 2021 Nebula Award for Best Novella. It was followed by a sequel, Defekt, in 2021.

Contents

Plot

Ava works at LitenVärld, a big box retail store, with her ex Jules. One day at work, a wormhole opens in the store. A customer's grandmother, Ursula Nouri, wanders inside. Ava and Jules are sent to fetch her using a tracking device called a FINNA. They travel through numerous parallel universes. In one, they find that Mrs. Nouri has been killed by parasitic plants; the FINNA directs them to a “suitable replacement”. They meet Captain Nouresh, an alternate-universe version of Mrs. Nouri. As they fight off dangerous drones, Ava escorts Nouresh back to her world; Jules stays behind. Ava quits her job and takes the FINNA in search of Jules.

Major themes

The novella criticizes the absurdities of capitalism and big box retail work. Ava and Jules are sent on a dangerous quest and offered gift cards in return. This is comparable to real-life examples in which minimum wage retail workers are mistreated by managers asking for the impossible. [1]

Reviewer Lee Mandelo wrote that Finna's protagonists are unique in that their romantic relationship has already ended. In contrast to a common story arc in which acquaintances develop a romantic relationship, Ava's and Jules's relationship is moving from romance into friendship. The reviewer notes that this is a common experience for queer people, whose dating groups and friend groups are likely to be closely intertwined. In addition to the relationship between Jules and Ava, the novella's queer themes are explored in its discussions of labor and politics. [2]

Reception

Finna received positive critical reviews.

Writing for NPR, author Amal El-Mohtar praised the author for accurately portraying queer identities, anxiety, and depression. [3] A review for Autostraddle criticized the work's excessive use of snark and felt that it detracted from its criticism of capitalism. Despite this, the same reviewer found that Cipri's "overarching points about capitalism’s dehumanizing effects are well-taken" and found the novella "an engaging and lively read". [4]

Awards

YearAwardCategoryResultRef.
2021 Hugo Awards Novella Shortlisted [5]
Lambda Literary Award Transgender Fiction Shortlisted [6]
Locus Award Novella Nominated—8th [7]
Nebula Awards Novella Shortlisted [8]

Related Research Articles

<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">N. K. Jemisin</span> American science fiction and fantasy writer

Nora Keita Jemisin is an American science fiction and fantasy writer. Her fiction includes a wide range of themes, notably cultural conflict and oppression. Her debut novel, The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, and the subsequent books in her Inheritance Trilogy received critical acclaim. She has won several awards for her work, including the Locus Award. The three books of her Broken Earth series made her the first author to win the Hugo Award for Best Novel in three consecutive years, as well as the first to win for all three novels in a trilogy. She won a fourth Hugo Award, for Best Novelette, in 2020 for Emergency Skin, and a fifth Hugo Award, for Best Graphic Story, in 2022 for Far Sector. Jemisin was a recipient of the MacArthur Fellows Program Genius Grant in 2020.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Max Gladstone</span> American fantasy author (born 1984)

Max Gladstone is an American fantasy author. He is best known for his 2012 debut novel Three Parts Dead, which is part of The Craft Sequence, his urban fantasy serial Bookburners, and for co-writing This Is How You Lose the Time War.

<i>The Lady Who Plucked Red Flowers Beneath the Queens Window</i> 2010 novella by Rachel Swirsky

"The Lady Who Plucked Red Flowers Beneath the Queen's Window" is a fantasy novella by American writer Rachel Swirsky. It explores the conjunction of invocation, deep time, and culture shock. It was originally published in Subterranean Magazine, in the summer of 2010, and subsequently republished in The Year’s Best Science Fiction and Fantasy 2011 and "The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year, Vol. 5".

"Souls" is a 1982 science fiction novella by Joanna Russ. It was first published in the Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction in January 1982, and subsequently republished in Terry Carr's The Best Science Fiction of the Year 12, in Russ's 1984 collection Extra(ordinary) People, as well as in the first volume of the Isaac Asimov/Martin H. Greenberg-edited anthology The New Hugo Winners, and in 1989 as half of a Tor Double Novel.

<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.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sam J. Miller</span> English science fiction, fantasy and horror short fiction author

Sam J. Miller is an American science fiction, fantasy and horror short fiction author. His stories have appeared in publications such as Clarkesworld, Asimov's Science Fiction, and Lightspeed, along with over 15 "year's best" story collections. He was finalist for multiple Nebula Awards along with the World Fantasy and Theodore Sturgeon Awards. He won the 2013 Shirley Jackson Award for his short story "57 Reasons for the Slate Quarry Suicides." His debut novel, The Art of Starving, was published in 2017 and his novel Blackfish City won the 2019 John W. Campbell Memorial Award.

"Seasons of Glass and Iron" is a 2016 fantasy story by Canadian writer Amal El-Mohtar. It was first published in the anthology The Starlit Wood: New Fairy Tales.

Neon Yang, formerly JY Yang, is a Singaporean writer of English-language speculative fiction best known for the Tensorate series of novellas published by Tor.com, which have been finalists for the Hugo Award, Locus Award, Nebula Award, World Fantasy Award, Lambda Literary Award, British Fantasy Award, and Kitschie Award. The first novella in the series, The Black Tides of Heaven, was named one of the "100 Best Fantasy Books of All Time" by Time magazine. Their debut novel, The Genesis of Misery, the first book in The Nullvoid Chronicles, was published in 2022 by Tor Books, received a starred review from Publishers Weekly, received a nomination for the 2022 Goodreads Choice Award for Science Fiction, and was a Finalist for the 2023 Locus Award for Best First Novel and 2023 Compton Crook Award.

<i>The Dream-Quest of Vellitt Boe</i> 2016 fantasy novella by Kij Johnson

The Dream-Quest of Vellitt Boe is a 2016 fantasy novella by American writer Kij Johnson, revisiting H. P. Lovecraft's The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath from the viewpoint of a woman. It was first published in trade paperback and ebook format by Tor.com.

Rivers Solomon is an American author of speculative and literary fiction. In 2018, they received the Community of Literary Magazines and Presses' Firecracker Award in Fiction for their debut novel, An Unkindness of Ghosts, and in 2020 their second novel, The Deep, won the Lambda Literary Award. Their third novel, Sorrowland, was published in May 2021, and won the Otherwise Award.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sarah Gailey</span> American author

Sarah Gailey is an American author of fantasy, science fiction, and mystery novels, short stories, and comics.

<i>This Is How You Lose the Time War</i> 2019 novel by Amal el-Mohtar and Max Gladstone

This Is How You Lose the Time War is a 2019 science fiction fantasy LGBT epistolary novel by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone. It was first published by Simon & Schuster. It won the BSFA Award for Best Shorter Fiction, the 2019 Nebula Award for Best Novella, the 2020 Locus Award for Best Novella, the 2020 Hugo Award for Best Novella.

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.

The Haunting of Tram Car 015 is an alternate history science fantasy police procedural novella by American novelist P. Djèlí Clark. It was first published by Tor.com in 2019.

Nino Cipri is a science fiction writer, editor, and educator. Their works have been nominated for the Nebula, Hugo, Locus, World Fantasy, and Shirley Jackson Awards.

<i>Fireheart Tiger</i> Novella by Aliette de Bodard

Fireheart Tiger is a 2021 fantasy novella by Aliette de Bodard.

<i>Upright Women Wanted</i> 2020 Western LGBT novella by Sarah Gailey

Upright Women Wanted is a 2020 Western LGBT novella by Sarah Gailey, their third published novella. In the novella, Esther escapes from an arranged marriage after her lover Beatriz is executed. She joins the Librarians, a group of women who distribute government propaganda to rural settlements, and finds that they are more than they seem. The work was nominated for the 2020 Hugo Award for Best Novella and 2020 Locus Award for Best Novella.

<i>We Are All Completely Fine</i> 2014 horror novel by Daryl Gregory

We Are All Completely Fine is a 2014 horror novel by Daryl Gregory. It was first published by Tachyon Publications. The book won the 2015 World Fantasy Award—Novella and the 2014 Shirley Jackson Award for Best Novella.

References

  1. Andrew Liptak (3 June 2020). "Book Review: 'Finna' by Nino Cipri". Seven Days . Retrieved 21 May 2021.
  2. Lee Mandelo (25 Feb 2020). "Wormholes and You: Finna by Nino Cipri". Tor. Retrieved 21 May 2021.
  3. Amal El-Mohtar (29 Feb 2020). "'Finna' Warns: Beware of the Fuzzy Chairs". NPR . Retrieved 18 May 2021.
  4. Jehan (10 March 2020). "Nino Cipri's "FINNA" Confronts Capitalism and Killer Furniture". Autostraddle . Retrieved 18 May 2021.
  5. "Announcing the 2021 Hugo Award Finalists". Tor.com. 13 Apr 2021. Retrieved 18 May 2021.
  6. Hillel Italie (15 March 2021). "Garth Greenwell, Douglas Stuart among Lambda award nominees". ABC News. Retrieved 18 May 2021.
  7. "2021 Locus Awards Top Ten Finalists". Locus Magazine. 1 May 2021. Retrieved 18 May 2021.
  8. "SFWA Announces the 56th Annual Nebula Award Finalists". 15 March 2021. Retrieved 18 May 2021.