There's No Red in Home: An Afrofuturist Novella

by G.K. Dadzi

Kwame has learned how to survive without calling it home. Caught between the memory of where he came from and the life he's built far from it, he moves through the world carrying a grief he never learned how to name. But when the fragile balance of his carefully controlled life begins to fracture, ancient forces stir beneath the surface—pulling him toward a reckoning he can no longer avoid.

As Kwame’s past rises to meet him, Leila searches for a future she can finally claim, and Kobe, a mysterious creature born of forgotten waters, becomes the unlikely thread binding their fates together. Across oceans, memories, and spiritual thresholds, their lives collide inside a hidden cosmic design shaped by ancient beings.

There’s No Red in Home is a mythic, Afrofuturist novella about masculinity, memory, and diaspora that ask the What is the cost of inheritance without consent—and what do we lose when “home” becomes conditional?

140 pages, Paperback

Published November 17, 2025

Reviews

[fede · Rating 3 out of 5]

The red in home is an exploration of how important it is to belong, to have a place to call home. A new Ghanaian art exhibit sparks protests in the country, irreversibly changing the lives of the two main characters, Kwame and Leila. I appreciate what this novella tried to do in just a few pages. The author weaves into the narrative stories from African folklore and discussions about identity and heritage, which was interesting to read. The writing is gorgeous and the structure of the novella is so creative. Nevertheless, I believe the story needed more space to breathe. There are some interesting ideas here, but the characters felt underdeveloped and the conflicts got solved too quickly. Moreover, there was no in-depth explanation of the crab’s magical world which made everything a bit confusing. For example, I had some difficulty following Kobe and Leila’s moments together. Perhaps this was done on purpose, but I would have liked for some aspects to be explored more in-depth. Overall, worth a read, although I do wish this novella was longer. If G. K. Dadzi decides to write a full novel, I’m all in!

Thank you to the publisher for the Advance Copy. All opinions are my own

[Tzia · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a brave short story, interweaving ancestral stories from Ghana with the narrative of two displaced Ghanaian people. Our two key human characters are Kwame and his girlfriend Leila. Both are proud of and want to preserve their culture and heritage but go about it in very different ways. Leila is an activist, looking to fight against those wanting to exploit her homeland; Kwame is quieter and more reserved, filled with a longing that he can't articulate.

We're not given a great deal of information on these two, so we can really only see and understand them in the context of the moment they're in. The telling of the story is fractured between their perspectives and that of other characters as well as being set in a number of different locations and switching timelines. It's beautifully written, and weaves the characters together well. The mixture of symbolism with the very real narratives of loss, inheritance and hope all come together well too.

Definitely thought provoking, this will be missed by a lot of readers. It's not polished and doesn't always feel coherent but I rather suspect that's the point. It's an interesting book to pick up, and I imagine will resonate on a number of different levels with the right audience.

- Thanks to NetGalley for grating me the ARC in exchange for an honest review -

[Maria reads SFF]

Thank you NetGalley for a free DRC of "The Red in Home" by G.K. Dadzi.
I love Afrofuturism so I was looking forward to give ths Novella a try.
Unfortunately it lacked clarity and it needed some polishing. The dialogue was confusing for the most part. Also having so many diferent points of view in such a short narrative did not helped.
While this Novella did not worked for me, I would like to try some more works bu this author in the future.