Feminist Science Fiction Fans discussion

This is the first book in the Dreamblood duology, the second of which is more feminist than this one, but this is still a great science fiction/supernatural novel written by a woman of colour.

I've finished both already, has anyone started?

There are a bunch of group members who had read it before you put it on the group's reading list. Fewer members had read the sequel for some reason.
As for myself, I knew I was going to read #2 before I finished #1. I read them not long after they came out and I must say I would have expected those books to be more popular than they are by now. I guess it goes to show how I have no clue about what people's tastes.

Maybe it'd best to discuss both books together next month since the second is more on-topic. Not that I want to discourage anyone from talking about #1 of course.
And there is one way in which the first book in particular is linked thematically with the work of some of the most famous feminist SF writers however: the pro-life/"anti-life" thing.

I've ordered both so that I can read the first before the second. Thought I might as well get properly involved with the group at the start of the month, rather than just lurking :)

I just started this - this is looking to me like just the sort of world building where I just want to curl up and not emerge for days and days! If only I could!

Still thoroughly enjoying myself!

So I'm curious Outis, how you see the "pro-life, anti-life" theme here as being more or less feminist than any work that considers life and death?

I'm not sure what works you're thinking about..
Do other SF-ish works than those of UKL, Tepper, Butler et al. have villainous or clueless characters spouting ideology about the sanctity of life, accuse heroes of being "anti-life" and so on?

Lots of other works are concerened with matters of life and death of course... but I'm of course talking about normative stuff. What other well-known works feature this sort of thing?
I can think of Make Room/Solyent Green and Logan's Run which I think my recollections are conflating a bit. The latter may be outright conservative while the politics of the former may be superficially feminist (or perhaps I should say merely-equal-rights feminist?). Or am I misremembering? Don't you think those reactionary anxiety-fueled dystopias contrast clearly with Jemisin's take on euthanasia?
I should bring up a more subtle example so: Revelation Space #2. It's got a reveal about the villains' pro-life values (kind of) but doesn't make a big deal out of it like the aforementionned authors. And if you look at the authors' other books, you unsurprisingly find many female main characters, female leaders and so forth. He also goes out of his way to be politically-correct in other respects, kind of like Jemisin.
I know I've only brought up two examples so you could say I'm cherry-picking but they're not that easy to come by... could anyone help me with other examples?

Yet I wouldn't have said Jemisin is taking a stand on euthanasia. She presents some arguments in favor of it and some against, the two major characters come down on either side of the issue, and any possible leaning towards the pro-camp is undercut by the underlying corruption. I see this more as a thought experiment, what-would-happen-if exercise, rather than a statement of beliefs.

Although I do agree with this statement: Don't you think those reactionary anxiety-fueled dystopias contrast clearly with Jemisin's take on euthanasia?

I didn't see it that way.
Seeing that it's fresh in your mind, what are the anti- arguments that didn't boil down to ignorance or bigotry? There hereos were in contrast very heroic.
It seems to me that the setting's magic validated euthansia. If a religion has practioners that actually perform miracles (and helpful ones at that), I'd say they're doing something right.
As to corruption, well... they can't have a dictatorial government without corruption now can they?

Arguments against:
First, the old woman dying in the caravan. Back in the city her permission wouldn't have been asked, she would simply have been gathered, but on the caravan he agreed to ask her permission first and was shocked to find that she wanted to continue on, in spite of her poor quality of life.
The father with the severely disabled son. He only sought death for his son when denied healing, it was clearly an afterthought, what was truly sought was the healing which was indeed possible.
All the deaths which were taken in error, such as the northerner, who had been presented as incurably ill, but which was later shown to be a complete lie.
The diplomat's (can't remember anybody's name) clear horror at the thought. (Did you see her as a villainous or clueless character?)
I think part of what makes this great is that she doesn't come down on either side of the argument.

I've made this thread include both titles so we don't have to divide the conversation. We are moving into the second title now so feel free to discuss, but use spoiler tags if you're revealing anything big too early on :)

So am I right in thinking we can discuss anything from book 1 without spoiler tags, but use them for #2 for now?

I understand there are people who see it your way, Alexa. In fact I guess I'm in the minority. And that what you got from the book is closer to what the author intended, seeing that you've probably got more in common with her than I do.
Maybe that's just my bias speaking (my views being closer to Jemisin's than to those of most authors, it's tempting for me to project my outlook on her) but I can't help but feel that she does come down on one side of the argument even if she tried not to (or simply tried not to be blatant about it). In that respect, the book fell short as far as I'm concerned. Not that I mind much... I liked the book for different reasons like the Dreaming Moon.

As to the arguments you mentionned:
I did remember the old woman, the northerner and Sunandi (the diplomat) but not the thing with the disabled son.
Of course if everything was as it should be there would be no story. There were mistakes but I do not see this as arguments against anymore than medical errors are an argument against medicine. That covers the northerner I think (I don't remember the specifics).
I remember the old woman as one of those instances where the author made of show of presenting an argument against. But I didn't think it was done convincingly. I remember her as being misguided. In the city people people would have been raised with a different outlook.
As to the diplomat, she was a foreign agent. To answer your question, I don't remember her as clueless as such and certainly not as villainous but rather as kind of bigoted and hopelessly biased (but maybe she was able to understand more by the end of the book?).
I should check the passage with the disabled son. Maybe there's a stronger argument there...

I guess on a certain level this could be viewed as another "ambiguous utopia." In that sense one might say Jemisin showed her hand. She sets up this utopian vision (which I think she does attempt to do in the beginning) and then she shows us all the ways it screws up, the compromises and ethical lapses and creeping decay of money and power. But in a sense she's saying that this could be a utopia, if only humans didn't screw it up. The flaw is in the execution (unintended pun there, but cute!) rather than the design.

I see what you mean but to me an utopia includes an ideal system of government. And the main flaw in the execution it seems to me (and if I recall correctly) is that the miracle workers stayed clear of politics, as if all pathologies could be addressed on an individual level. That way they could easily keep their hands clean... for a time.

Unless there's more than one disabled son in the book, I found that passage. "Disabled" is not the word I would use though: he had long been begging to be put to death.
Yeah, healing was in principle possible... and he should have been healed long before it got so bad. Only the jealous ruling caste(s) wouldn't allow it. His family surely knew where they might have gotten help... but at what risk and cost? And at best, they would have lost the son anyway as their oppressors would have banished him.
I had forgotten how vile the regime Sunandi served was. She's not a villian herself but she sure has a villainous background!
I can't see an argument against euthansia in that passage. If the book's societies weren't afflicted with power-mad dictators and had the resources to help everyone, sure: you wouldn't want kids who could be healed to be put down no matter how much they want it. But that wasn't the situation.

Ah, it is so wonderful to be reading something truly worth reading!

About ambiguous utopias, I'm re-reading Dispossessed. I don't think I had read it more than once as a kid actually. I find I had forgotten most of it. Like, there is some talk about pain and suicide...

Hmmm, I don't remember that part at all. Any conclusions?

I'm far from finished with the re-read but so far I've found nothing normative enough (to re-use the distinction I brought up above) to rate as pro-life or pro-choice in there. That said, the main character seems to have mild suicidal tendencies so these issues are occasionally brought. And the social consciousness of the anarchists obviously contrasts with the outlooks of most other characters, including Dreamblood's.
On the one hand you have the "suffering is dysfunctional" idea which interestingly enough is a conservative argument in that context and on the other you have the main characters and his buddy arguing that suffering and pain (which they seem to conflate, oddly enough) motivates change. Suicide is not considered as an alternative to facing a terminal illness* but to undertaking revolutionary activity. Also: "It's the self that suffers, and there's a place where the self - ceases." and "I'm trying to say what I think brotherhood really is. It begins - it begins in shared pain."
The comparison between the books highlights the problem with Dreamblood's miracle workers I mentionned above: they've got a really cool hammer so they see every problem as a nail. In Dispossessed, some pathologies are understood as individual and others as social (not simply a collection of individual pathologies) even if the symptoms are showing up in individuals.

* Though there was one instance (so far) of a dying man being allowed to suffer following an accident, he seems to have died before someone trained to deal with casualties could intervene so we don't know if they were waiting for someone to declare him a hopeless case or something. I don't know about you but even in the case of a pet I wouldn't put them out of their misery before getting a vet to see them (just in case there was an easier/cheaper treatment than I had guessed).
At least you do get the sense that they would have given him strong painkiller shots if they had any on hand. They clearly don't have that Christian fetish about physical pain.

Your summary underscores that, in the end, this is fantasy, although beautifully written, thought-provoking fantasy. I just finished it - and it was really wonderful. I think I liked it even better than the first, more nuanced, and somehow more satisfying.

I liked the first better but that's only because it's the one which introduced a setting I love. As far as the story and characters are concerned, I think #2 is superior.
My main reservation about those books is that I disliked both endings.

Did the anthropological aspect of #2 also remind you of UKL by the way?

Anthropological? As in examining the different ways gender is expressed in the various communities? Now that you mention it, one can sort of see shades of Genly Ai trying to figure things out - although Hanani is never quite as clueless. But really, here, we're the observers.

I wasn't thinking about poor Genly. She has shorter stories that revolve more around anthropolgical issues, at least one of which (that I can remember right now) is about an anthropological rather than diplomatic mission. But even in Left Hand, IIRC you have at least one chapter written from the point of view of someone other than Genly (and perhaps even more clueless!) acting in the capacity of an anthropologist.
And yeah, none of the characters in Dreamblood are anything like anthropologists. Only some of the details Jemisin choose to show her readers are the kind of thing an anthropologist might focus on. I guess you could say that's designed to make us into observers of sorts... but definitely not participating observers!

Now that I've read more of Dispossessed, some irrational reluctance to put down people was on display later on. There's no mention of encouraging people to choose death in such circumstances either. So while none of that is normative, you could say that book's anarchists have values that are more in line with Sunandi's or even those of the Hainish cycle's "Enemy".
But I don't think such attitudes are the product of some kind of pro-life ideology. Instead, I read them as a symptom of extreme individualism. Precisely because it's driven them to renounce coercion, they need to repress individualism psychologically (which is why shame is such a big deal in the book). And that repression being more apparent the thing itself, some readers might only pick up on the former. But aside from the free range given to informal authority which features proeminently in the plot (and which seems to have been a preoccupation of real-world feminists back in the day), there are lots of odd details pointing to the central role of individualism in their culture such as their uncharacteristically sexist norms about rape.
The book turned out to be more group-topical than I recalled by the way.
I guess the above is a lot more than you bargained for when you asked "any conclusions?". :-)


Now, since half of the month is past... about The Shadowed Sun:
Did you think Jemisin went too far with sexual abuse? I mean: Butler for instance is often needlessly unpleasant when it comes up in her stories. This book isn't that bad but still... I feel she could have used a lighter touch.
Something else: as mentionned above "in the end, this is fantasy"... but did you think that, aside from the matter of abuse, the book's take on gender has much relevance to real-world concerns?

Just a brief reply, because I'm half asleep - your analysis of The Dispossessed makes me realize how much of it I've forgotten - I really need to read it again before I can make much comment.

Actually, I thought there was lots there of relevance - the way men and women were only allowed to step out of their gender roles if they took on the clothing as well, the putting of women on pedestals as an excuse for not giving them civil rights, the way the desert folk allowed their women significantly more agency, yet still there were sharply defined gender roles, the way sexual abuse can still exist under circumstances that appear to grant financial power to women. I'm sure there are lots more - but that's a start.

I had hoped you would elaborate after you had some sleep.
Because I don't see how some of these have much relevance to our lives. Like, today people aren't required to cross-dress to do something atypical. Men wear dresses in court or in church, not to feed babies.
Financial power can at best only protect a minority against any sort of violence by the way.

That reminds me: It's not been mentionned in this thread that there's also a Gujaareen short story. And it features a character "stepping out their gender role".
the story: http://transcriptase.org/fiction/jemi...
alternatively, an audio version: http://media.rawvoice.com/podcastle/m...

Loved these books, The Shadowed Sun even more than The Killing Moon. Loved Hanani's character, but I almost wish SPOILER: she hadn't ended up the prince at the end. Jemisin's writing and plotting is superior. I'm going to read her Inheritance trilogy next. I think that the story of a singular women trying to make it in a man's profession and having to deal with being the best and working harder than any other is still very relevant in today's world.

In case the topic speaks to you more, Jemisin has a new book which seems to have been delayed for some reason even though people have had advance copies for a while: www.goodreads.com/book/show/19161852-...
She published at least one short in that setting and it strikes me as more interesting than the 100K Kingdoms. De gustibus though.

Last time I went to the ER, the surgeon was a women and so was her trainee. I've heard people objecting to being treated by a doctor based on the color of their skin but never because she was a woman. Sexual harassment on the job on the other hand, that's something one hears about.
I haven't researched the issue but the only professions I can think of right now in which women seem to have no place are either trades (like building trades) or jobs no one wants to do. Certainly nothing as glamourous as Hanani's calling... which is more like a ministry than a profession anyway. And last time I went to a burial service, the minister was a woman. Again, I heard no comment whereas I've heard comments about the skin color of clergy.
I gather some religious communities are more sexist but so as far as I can tell, the seventies are truly over and the ongoing disrespect for traditionally feminine professions is a much more serious social problem.