/lit/ - Literature

Is this bait?

BUY MY BOOK MOFUGGING WHYTEBOI

>At the very northern tip of Manhattan lies one of the last wild places in New York City, a swath of ancient forest that has survived more or less undisturbed for hundreds of years. On an overcast afternoon, the park is relatively quiet, save for the occasional squawk of migrating geese and the distant groan of the Metro-North winding up the Hudson. A solitary jogger lopes along a dirt path edging the dense woods. “I love this park because it’s the last of the forest as it used to be, before we showed up and fucked up everybody’s shit,” fantasy writer N.K. Jemisin tells me as we set off through the woods, her hands tucked pensively into the pockets of a long gray cardigan. After a moment, she adds an important caveat. “Well, I mean, technically my ancestors weren’t fucking anybody up. They were just being fucked up. That said … ” She drifts off, her eyes on the red oaks overhead. Reality always creeps into Jemisin’s fantasies, whether she wants it to or not.

>We’re here on a research expedition to gather details for a scene in her new trilogy, which she describes as a magical battle for the soul of New York City. Over the last decade, Jemisin, a former practicing psychologist, has become one of the world’s most acclaimed authors of science fiction and fantasy, known for crafting richly imagined fantastical realms and melding elements like mysterious sentient floating crystals with searing critiques of contemporary political power structures. For her new book, she wanted to write something light and fun — “a palate cleanser” about tentacled monsters — but Jemisin can never stay away from heavy themes for long. Partway through her first draft, it dawned on her that the new book was really about gentrification and racism. “I just want to write about things blowing up. Gods and planets and moons crashing into things,” she tells me. “But what I write ends up being very political. If I write about dragons, I’m writing about dragons as a black woman, and it’s fucking political.”