These Lifeless Things by Premee Mohamed tantalizes with evocative ideas, excellent characterization, and beautiful language. It is a perfect story to tell in novella form, a snippet of a post-apocalyptic world where humanity has been defeated too many times to make sense of its struggle. Mohamed alternates the book’s narration between tense, hopeless diary entries and commentary by an anthropologist who has discovered the diary in question decades later. This isn’t a plot-driven tale; rather, it’s thematically rich, with layered backstory and worldbuilding which rewards a second read.
The two narrators are Emerson, the anthropologist, and Eva, the diarist. Emerson lives in a comfortable world not too different from our own (phones, computers, and other technology are mentioned), part of a team of scientists visiting a “siege city” on a research trip. Eva lives in a nightmarish combat zone, scavenging supplies from the destroyed city and eating human flesh to surviv
Thu Jan 21, 2021 11:03am
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Rebellion Publishing is getting in the novella game: Today, the publisher announced Solaris Satellites, a series that will publish three SFF novellas each year. The first Satellites, available this year, are from Premee Mohamed, Derek Künsken, and Wayne Santos.
“Novellas are where the genre is at right now: a neat little package, with more room to breathe than a short but without the hulking commitment of a novel (or series!). Some of the cleverest, most exciting stories of the past few years have been novellas, and we’re thrilled to be adding more of them to our schedule,” editor David Thomas Moore, who created the Satellites project, said in a press release.