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Invisible #2
Invisible 2: Personal Essays on Representation in SF/F
19 essays on the importance of representation in science fiction and fantasy, with an introduction by author Aliette de Bodard. Proceeds from the sale of this collection go to the Carl Brandon Society to support Con or Bust.
Full table of contents:
Introduction by Aliette de Bodard
Breaking Mirrors by Diana M. Pho
I'm Not Broken by Annalee Flower Horne
Next Year in Jerusalem by Gabrielle Harbowy
I Am Not Hispanic, I Am Puerto Rican by Isabel Schechter
No More Dried Up Spinsters by Nancy Jane Moore
False Expectations by Matthew Alan Thyer (credited as Matthew Thyer)
Text, Subtext, and Pieced-Together Lives by Angelia Sparrow
Parenting as a Fan of Color by Kat Tanaka Okopnik
Alien of Extraordinary Ability? by Bogi Takács
Accidental Representation by Chrysoula Tzavelas
Discovering the Other by John G. Hartness (credited as John Hartness)
Lost in the Margins by Sarah Chorn
Too Niche by Lauren Jankowski
Fat Chicks in SFF by Alis Franklin
Not Your Mystical Indian by Jessica McDonald
Exponentially Hoping by A. Merc Rustad (credited as Merc Rustad)
Colonialism, Land, and Speculative Fiction: An Indigenous Perspective by Ambelin Kwaymullina
Nobody's Sidekick: Intersectionality in Protagonists by S.L. Huang
The Danger of the False Narrative by LaShawn M. Wanak (credited as LaShawn Wanak)
Afterword by Jim C. Hines
Full table of contents:
Introduction by Aliette de Bodard
Breaking Mirrors by Diana M. Pho
I'm Not Broken by Annalee Flower Horne
Next Year in Jerusalem by Gabrielle Harbowy
I Am Not Hispanic, I Am Puerto Rican by Isabel Schechter
No More Dried Up Spinsters by Nancy Jane Moore
False Expectations by Matthew Alan Thyer (credited as Matthew Thyer)
Text, Subtext, and Pieced-Together Lives by Angelia Sparrow
Parenting as a Fan of Color by Kat Tanaka Okopnik
Alien of Extraordinary Ability? by Bogi Takács
Accidental Representation by Chrysoula Tzavelas
Discovering the Other by John G. Hartness (credited as John Hartness)
Lost in the Margins by Sarah Chorn
Too Niche by Lauren Jankowski
Fat Chicks in SFF by Alis Franklin
Not Your Mystical Indian by Jessica McDonald
Exponentially Hoping by A. Merc Rustad (credited as Merc Rustad)
Colonialism, Land, and Speculative Fiction: An Indigenous Perspective by Ambelin Kwaymullina
Nobody's Sidekick: Intersectionality in Protagonists by S.L. Huang
The Danger of the False Narrative by LaShawn M. Wanak (credited as LaShawn Wanak)
Afterword by Jim C. Hines
82 pages, Kindle Edition
First published May 12, 2015
13 people are currently reading
161 people want to read
About the author
Jim C. Hines
95 books2,388 followersJim C. Hines began his writing career with a trilogy about the irrepressible Jig the goblin, which actor and author Wil Wheaton described as "too f***ing cool for words." He went on to deconstruct fairy tales in his four-book Princess series, made all the world's literature a grimoire in the Magic ex Libris series, and explored the heroic side of spacecraft sanitation in his Janitors of the Post Apocalypse trilogy. His short fiction has appeared in more than fifty magazines and anthologies. Jim has been outspoken about topics like sexism and harassment, and was the editor of the Invisible series—three collections of personal essays about representation in sf/f. He received the Hugo Award for Best Fan Writer in 2012. Jim currently lives in mid-Michigan.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
December 4, 2016
This second volume is just as interesting as the first. There is more attention to native/indigenous population as well as age.
March 1, 2016
Invisible 2: Personal Essays about Representation in Science Fiction, edited by Jim C. Hines, is the second collection of essays about the visibility - and invisibility - of people who are not straight, white, cis, nominally Christian, able-bodied, and most likely male in speculative fiction.
I haven't read the first Invisible collection, but I am certainly going looking for it now that I've read the second.
These are essays about never finding someone like yourself in the genre that you love, or only finding yourself rarely, usually as a side-kick or bit player, or maybe a villain, but almost never a real hero. Or finding only caricatures of people like you, stereotypical images that are almost as bad as never seeing yourself at all. And some stories about what it's like to find somebody like you, a fully realised character, a hero.
As Aliette de Bodard writes in her Introduction,
These essays remind us of all the people who are all too often invisible in speculative fiction, the people we need to see if we are to have stories that reflect the breadth and depth of the human condition. The people represented - and representing - in this volume include people of colour - not just the generic Latin@, Asian, Black, Indigenous groupings, but Vietnamese and Puerto Rican and Japanese and Cherokee and other members of specific cultures who want to be seen for themselves, not as part of some general non-white conglomerate.
The people writing these essays are queer, and trans, and genderfluid, and asexual, and survivors of abuse rather than victims, and think that they deserve to have their stories told so that others, especially young people growing up without any one who shares their experiences around them, will know they have a right to exist, that they are not alone.
They are Jewish, and pagan, they are immigrants, they are older women, they are disabled and non-neurotypical, they are fat, they are people with life histories and experiences that lie outside the straight cis able-bodied white male paradigm that it so often seems our understanding of humanity is based on.
Some of them are even examples of that paradigm, talking about how they have come to treasure the stories that are not about them. And it's all good reading.
I haven't read the first Invisible collection, but I am certainly going looking for it now that I've read the second.
These are essays about never finding someone like yourself in the genre that you love, or only finding yourself rarely, usually as a side-kick or bit player, or maybe a villain, but almost never a real hero. Or finding only caricatures of people like you, stereotypical images that are almost as bad as never seeing yourself at all. And some stories about what it's like to find somebody like you, a fully realised character, a hero.
As Aliette de Bodard writes in her Introduction,
The trouble with stories, of course, is that they don’t exist in a vacuum. They are shaped, too, by the culture in which they were born—and worse than that, by the dominant culture. Stories tell you what to value, and what not to value—they teach you, over and over, that some people get to be heroes and some don’t. That some behaviours like violence are acceptable and heroic; others (like mothers sacrificing themselves to the bone year after year to raise their children) aren’t even worth a mention.
And stories, in the end, shape that dominant culture. Telling the same story that we ourselves have been told, over and over, erases all the others. It tells some people—those outside the dominant cultural paradigm—that they don't deserve to have stories told about them. That people like them never get their own books or their own stories; that they are not worth writing about; which a lesson no-one should have to learn.
These essays remind us of all the people who are all too often invisible in speculative fiction, the people we need to see if we are to have stories that reflect the breadth and depth of the human condition. The people represented - and representing - in this volume include people of colour - not just the generic Latin@, Asian, Black, Indigenous groupings, but Vietnamese and Puerto Rican and Japanese and Cherokee and other members of specific cultures who want to be seen for themselves, not as part of some general non-white conglomerate.
The people writing these essays are queer, and trans, and genderfluid, and asexual, and survivors of abuse rather than victims, and think that they deserve to have their stories told so that others, especially young people growing up without any one who shares their experiences around them, will know they have a right to exist, that they are not alone.
They are Jewish, and pagan, they are immigrants, they are older women, they are disabled and non-neurotypical, they are fat, they are people with life histories and experiences that lie outside the straight cis able-bodied white male paradigm that it so often seems our understanding of humanity is based on.
Some of them are even examples of that paradigm, talking about how they have come to treasure the stories that are not about them. And it's all good reading.
November 17, 2016
This important collection of essays not only illustrates how representation matters, it also makes the argument in a personal way for each of the authors. Highly recommended, especially for those of us who often don't have trouble recognizing ourselves in literature. Bonus: it also contains many recommendations of diverse literature and links to further essays.
November 22, 2016
Building on its predecessor, Invisible, this is another thought-provoking series of essays about what it feels like to be unrepresented, or represented poorly, in speculative fiction.
March 9, 2016
An important and and powerful collection of essays on diversity and its lack of positive and accurate representation in the genre of science fiction and fantasy.
August 17, 2016
This is the second collection of essays on diversity and representation in SFF, originally published on Jim Hines' blog, and it's even better than the first. This one brings in religion, veteran status, age, size, indigeneity, immigration and surviving sexual assault, alongside essays that focus on disability, neurodiversity, race, gender (and not just binary gender) and sexuality, like the first book. The writing is strong, and the viewpoints are wide-ranging. I highly recommend reading it if you have a commitment to social justice, to help understand both the range of identities that are often excluded from or misrepresented in the media around us (and yes, media most definitely includes books), and what the effects of that exclusion/misrepresentation can be.
August 19, 2016
"When I didn't see myself in a mirror, I smashed it and saw myself in the pieces" (Diana Pho,"Breaking Mirrors"). This is a sequel to 2014's "Invisible" also edited by Jim Hines, and it expands upon the lack of any/positive representation in SF/F including abuse survivors, Jewish (but not a stereotype), ageism, parenting mixed race children, non-neurotypical characters, bisexuality, fat characters, asexuality, Native Americans and other indigenous peoples, and other persons of color. This volume includes a bibliography listing works with under-represented characters. I read this for my 2016 Reading Challenge "read a book of essays" (Bustle Reads).
September 18, 2016
This is a collection of essays written by sf/f fans, about finding or not finding representation of part of their identities in sf/f.
This is the second volume, and I liked it better than the first one. I'm not sure if it had more variety, or more depth in most of the essays, or maybe a combination of both. I suspect Hines had more personal essays to choose from in compiling this volume.
They can be heartbreaking to read. They can be inspiring to read. They'll open your eyes to looking at the sf/f you're consuming in a different way.
I highly recommend this book to anyone, but specifically to sf/f creators, writers, artists, editors, publishers.
This is the second volume, and I liked it better than the first one. I'm not sure if it had more variety, or more depth in most of the essays, or maybe a combination of both. I suspect Hines had more personal essays to choose from in compiling this volume.
They can be heartbreaking to read. They can be inspiring to read. They'll open your eyes to looking at the sf/f you're consuming in a different way.
I highly recommend this book to anyone, but specifically to sf/f creators, writers, artists, editors, publishers.
January 10, 2017
A really excellent and diverse collections of essays on the importance of diverse rep in SFF. Some were completely unexpected, like Thyer's essay on the way the military/military service is portrayed vs reality and the impact that had on him as a vet. Others were expected but wonderfully nuanced, like Pho's Breaking Mirrors. I also loved Moore's essay on older women in SFF and Kwaymullina's essay on an indigenous perspective of speculative fiction. All wonderfully readable and mind-expanding. Highly recommend.
February 1, 2017
A must read for authors
The book is powerful, inspiring, heartbreaking, and sometimes difficult to read but so very necessary. Each of us can do better, can create more diverse and complex characters. This book will help you do that.
The book is powerful, inspiring, heartbreaking, and sometimes difficult to read but so very necessary. Each of us can do better, can create more diverse and complex characters. This book will help you do that.
November 21, 2016
Another great series of essays. Everyone who enjoys science fiction and fantasy should read these. Or even if you don't.
October 17, 2019
Further essays collected by Hines that show why we need representation in SF/F. I appreciated that this collection dealt with a broader variety of marginalizations than the first. In particular, I appreciated that there were essays on both asexuality and Judaism. Though the experience described in the essay about being a Jewish reader is different from my own, a lot of it still spoke to me. I was bothered that an essay on disability was written by an ally rather than a disabled person, but other than that, yet another great collection.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews