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Making Amends
Starting an interstellar penal colony could be an extremely practical idea, right? It could even provide a sponsoring corporation a good Return on Investment—though of course their initial investment would be massive. Making Amends is a novel-in-stories that tells how a corporate government tries to put this idea into action. Beginning with the selection of the first mission’s “volunteer” crew and culminating with the idea’s lovely and unforeseen consequences, Making Amends immerses readers in strange new worlds, worlds precious to discover, tricky to explore, and beautiful to behold.
Advance
Making Amends is an unsettling, immersive, out-of-body exploration of the future of the prison industrial complex and artificial intelligence that transports readers through sub-light speeds to an unexplored planet. Watching the world of Nisi Shawl’s creation unfold through the voices of intriguing characters – both human and AI – I couldn’t help but think about how our country’s justice system could lead to the terrifyingly disproportionate retribution in these linked stories. By the end of the book, I was left understanding more about how power changes people, and how even in the bleakest of times, love, resistance, and community can blossom.
—LaToya Jordan, author of Shirley Jackson award winning
To the Woman in the Pink Hat
Advance
Making Amends is an unsettling, immersive, out-of-body exploration of the future of the prison industrial complex and artificial intelligence that transports readers through sub-light speeds to an unexplored planet. Watching the world of Nisi Shawl’s creation unfold through the voices of intriguing characters – both human and AI – I couldn’t help but think about how our country’s justice system could lead to the terrifyingly disproportionate retribution in these linked stories. By the end of the book, I was left understanding more about how power changes people, and how even in the bleakest of times, love, resistance, and community can blossom.
—LaToya Jordan, author of Shirley Jackson award winning
To the Woman in the Pink Hat
173 pages, Kindle Edition
Published January 13, 2025
3 people are currently reading
45 people want to read
About the author
Nisi Shawl
134 books588 followersNisi Shawl is a founder of the diversity-in-speculative-fiction nonprofit the Carl Brandon Society and serves on the Board of Directors of the Clarion West Writers’ Workshop. Their story collection Filter House was a winner of the 2009 Tiptree/Otherwise Award, and their debut novel, Everfair, was a 2016 Nebula finalist. Shawl edited Bloodchildren: Stories by the Octavia E. Butler Scholars (2013). They coedited Strange Matings: Science Fiction, Feminism, African American Voices, and Octavia E. Butler (2013).
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
February 19, 2025
3.5 rounded up.
This is a tough one. Originally, this book started out as short stories published in different places, but put together for this book. It shows in how disjointed the book felt.
I think most everyone has seen a movie or read a book about a prison planet where the prisoners have to fight! for freedom! Usually, it's some muscle-bound guy trying to escape, he was FRAMED! and all the other prisoners fight against him, and each other blah blah blah. It's an old trope.
The author turns this idea around, and looks at it from a very different angle. Many questions are brought up, like why are these people being sent to a distant planet from which they can never return? How do they get there if the voyage takes over 80 years? How do they survive, once they arrive?
The answers were always creative. I can't fault the book for lack of ideas, there were so many of them that had my brain going yes! That's what I'm looking for in a science fiction book.
The story is linear, starting with how the planet Amends was founded, and with who would be the trustees - the people who would oversee the other prisoners. This part was futuristic with AI, and augments, and other technologies.
Then the story transitions to Amends, and this is where the story really captivated me. Everything on Amends was vibrant and fascinating. The way their culture developed, their relationships with each other, and the planet itself kept me wanting more. Honestly, as interesting as the first part was, I wish the entire book had taken place on Amends.
I don't want to spoil anything, but a highlight of the book was how gender was handled. Another is how the people explored the planet.
Glad I read this book, overall it was thought provoking.
This is a tough one. Originally, this book started out as short stories published in different places, but put together for this book. It shows in how disjointed the book felt.
I think most everyone has seen a movie or read a book about a prison planet where the prisoners have to fight! for freedom! Usually, it's some muscle-bound guy trying to escape, he was FRAMED! and all the other prisoners fight against him, and each other blah blah blah. It's an old trope.
The author turns this idea around, and looks at it from a very different angle. Many questions are brought up, like why are these people being sent to a distant planet from which they can never return? How do they get there if the voyage takes over 80 years? How do they survive, once they arrive?
The answers were always creative. I can't fault the book for lack of ideas, there were so many of them that had my brain going yes! That's what I'm looking for in a science fiction book.
The story is linear, starting with how the planet Amends was founded, and with who would be the trustees - the people who would oversee the other prisoners. This part was futuristic with AI, and augments, and other technologies.
Then the story transitions to Amends, and this is where the story really captivated me. Everything on Amends was vibrant and fascinating. The way their culture developed, their relationships with each other, and the planet itself kept me wanting more. Honestly, as interesting as the first part was, I wish the entire book had taken place on Amends.
I don't want to spoil anything, but a highlight of the book was how gender was handled. Another is how the people explored the planet.
Glad I read this book, overall it was thought provoking.
December 19, 2025
To be clear: "Amends" is an extrasolar world, and "Making" means colonizing it.
In a middle-near future, the rich (code word for: White) rule the poor (code word for: not-White) largely through corporate power -- or at least in the Western Hemisphere, this is true; we never learn much about the rest of the world.
The first story is set in a prison/school/orbital colony/something -- its exact economic nature is never made exactly clear -- where poor (non-White, and clearly mostly Black) young people live a violent life. A young woman who escaped a while back now returns as an agent to recruit people for a colonial mission to Amends (not named in this story).
The trick, as we eventually learn: the colonists are stripped of their bodies and stored in computer modules for the decades-long journey. When they arrive, new bodies are grown for them -- bodies cloned from (White) "victims" of "crimes." So, as they gradually realize, they are essentially being used as breeding stock for their oppressors.
The stories range from brutal to gently beautiful, sometimes within the same story. I don't want to tell too much about the individual stories, because there's so much juice in them that I don't want to spill.
But (here at least) Nisi Shawl writes like a demon; they are the closest living thing to a kind of cross between Octavia Butler and Harlan Ellison, and I mean that in a good way. I recommend this book highly.
9 out of 10 totally not suspicious surveillance devices
In a middle-near future, the rich (code word for: White) rule the poor (code word for: not-White) largely through corporate power -- or at least in the Western Hemisphere, this is true; we never learn much about the rest of the world.
The first story is set in a prison/school/orbital colony/something -- its exact economic nature is never made exactly clear -- where poor (non-White, and clearly mostly Black) young people live a violent life. A young woman who escaped a while back now returns as an agent to recruit people for a colonial mission to Amends (not named in this story).
The trick, as we eventually learn: the colonists are stripped of their bodies and stored in computer modules for the decades-long journey. When they arrive, new bodies are grown for them -- bodies cloned from (White) "victims" of "crimes." So, as they gradually realize, they are essentially being used as breeding stock for their oppressors.
The stories range from brutal to gently beautiful, sometimes within the same story. I don't want to tell too much about the individual stories, because there's so much juice in them that I don't want to spill.
But (here at least) Nisi Shawl writes like a demon; they are the closest living thing to a kind of cross between Octavia Butler and Harlan Ellison, and I mean that in a good way. I recommend this book highly.
9 out of 10 totally not suspicious surveillance devices
January 31, 2025
Shawl developed this idea of a prison planet over time; who it would incarcerate (politicals and teachers, mainly), how it would transfer the prisoners (downloaded personalities into cloned bodies on arrival).
It's a bit of a fix-up novel as the chapters were published separately over time in different publications. This used to be pretty common in science fiction ('The Martian Chronicles' is one example). It allows the author to move around and showcase different aspects of the idea, but it can be a bit disjointed because the parts were not originally written to be continuous.
Shawl shows the resilience of people (mainly people of color) who are thrown out with nothing to work with. They show the close loving connections that can be made despite (or because of) incredible hardship. They also show variations of artificial intelligence that are a bit different than what we usually see.
It's a bit of a fix-up novel as the chapters were published separately over time in different publications. This used to be pretty common in science fiction ('The Martian Chronicles' is one example). It allows the author to move around and showcase different aspects of the idea, but it can be a bit disjointed because the parts were not originally written to be continuous.
Shawl shows the resilience of people (mainly people of color) who are thrown out with nothing to work with. They show the close loving connections that can be made despite (or because of) incredible hardship. They also show variations of artificial intelligence that are a bit different than what we usually see.
May 16, 2025
Nisi Shawl can build a world like no other.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews