Blueprints for Better Worlds

by Tenea D. Johnson

Two girls barely in their teens devise an escape from a world abandoned by the privileged, ravaged by climate change, and losing its way. Will they find what the world has lost and what they’ve so far only found in one another?

Can a manufactured heaven floating amongst the stars provide more than illusions of perfection? How might it improve the world that its customers vacated?

When all you have left is the space between you, can you overcome the distance, and what might be lurking in the things that you don’t say, the days you can’t share, the secrets you keep from yourself?

In the absence of government, how can the people left behind avoid a grim fate of air thinner by the day, hope thinner by the hour?

Is home where you’re from or how it treats you? How much a home is a place where you’re not equal? Might you change that by stepping into another person’s life? Or stepping into new territories within your own?

Once forever is attainable what will it be spent on and in this ultimate success of sustainability who decides what exactly should be sustained?

Only one way to find out.

From award-winning author Tenea D. Johnson comes Blueprints for Better Worlds. In these linked stories, discover.

Genres: Science Fiction, Short Stories

89 pages, Kindle Edition

Published May 18, 2020

Reviews

[Sarah Cavar · Rating 3 out of 5]

An encouraging three stars. This author is a great storyteller with awesome ideas, but this novella needed to be about 4x longer, minimum, and these interrelated stories felt more like sketches of longer works than works unto themselves.

[Jonathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked the ideas here, but I had the feeling that this would have been more successful with significant expansion.

[Sen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jak, is it how we imagined it? Do the stars seem close enough to touch? Do you eat every day? Have you seen a meteor yet? Tell me everything.

★★★★

A lovely little gem of a science fiction book containing a few different perspectives but ultimately circling around two young women, Jak and Clem, who dream of a life beyond the stars away from their climatically ravaged Earth. Their story was incredibly poignant and definitely my favorite. I especially adored the first half of this book where we follow Jak and Clem as they scavenge for pieces in a boneyard of ancient technology from a bygone era to use for their own constructs. Blueprints for Better Worlds is a tale that simultaneously describes a future that is bleak but is still somehow so full of hope. Unfortunately, I did have a hard time following what was going on towards the end but I feel like this is one of those books that warrants a reread.

— ♩♫♩ ~ S.T.A.Y.

[Casey Henderson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This wasn't the easiest read. The narrative was scattered. I felt every word. However I don't know what happened to two of the main characters? I don't know. Maybe I missed something. I loved it though.

[Rebecca · Rating 3 out of 5]

Girls changing the world using their mastry of technology and engineering. A spaceship that teaches anticolonialism. People who defy the odds to build a better world. Tenea D Johnson imagines a future and invites us along.