https://killingmykindle.com/2018/07/03/episode-1-25-the-more-things-change-the-more-they-stay-the-same/ Wherein I review: 94. Underground Airlines by Ben H. Winters 95. Moonbreaker (Secret Histories #11) by Simon R. Green 96. Vanishing Games (Jack White #2) by Roger Hobbs 97. Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill Another white guy writes about the black experience, and I guess I’m becoming okay with it, because they’re doing a damn good job of it. Simon Green starts to bring the Droods into a crash landing in the Nightside. Roger Hobbs keeps his Ghostman going strong. And Jenny Offill […]
When Speculative Fiction Speculates All Too Well
Like many of the books I read, I first heard about Underground Airlines on NPR—in a book review by Maureen Corrigan on Fresh Air. It came out about the same time as Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead. Because I read Whitehead’s novel first, that world was rattling through my head as I entered the alternative history that Ben Winter has created—where the civil war never happened and where slavery still exists in the United States, even if it’s only confined to four southern states. It’s […]
A Modern Spin on the Underground Railroad
Underground Airlines made a lot of Best of 2016 lists, and I was lucky enough to snap it up at the library before the hold list got too long. It’s a story about what the world would look like if the Civil War had never happened, and slavery was still legal in America. Not surprisingly, it’s kind of a horrifying look. The protagonist is something of a bounty hunter, tracking down escaped slaves before they can make it to Canada and freedom, and his personal […]
In which I project my hypocritical political ire…
Set in an alternate United States, in which Abraham Lincoln was assassinated before taking office, the Civil War was never fought, and slaves were never emancipated, Underground Airlines is the story of a young black man (who goes by various names) working as a bounty hunter for the US Marshal service. His job? Hunting escaped slaves in contemporary America. First, this was a very well-written book. It’s in the style of a hard-boiled detective novel, and the world building by Ben Winters is fairly well […]