Sheree R. Thomas, ed., Dark Matter: Reading the Bones (Warner Books, 2004)
I don't think there's an anthology in existence that isn't flawed. Even those like the Fantasy Hall of Fame, supposedly the best of the best, voted by a jury of its peers — well, I could debate several of their choices.
Dark Matter: Reading the Bones, is the second in the Dark Matter series, speculative fiction stories collected from the African Diaspora. The stories range from the era of the slave trade into the far future, take their flavour from around the world, and cover a range from nearly straight folk tales into hard science fiction.
They also cover a range from breathtakingly good to shockingly mediocre.
"ibo landing," the opening story, is written in small broken segments, through various eyes on a slaver ship, and at a harbour landing. The story within is a scrap of folktale, but the experimental style works in its favour. It allows for several things: differing opinions on the event that makes the climax and close of the story, a glimpse of how many divergent cultures have been crushed together in the slaver-ship's hold — and how many people within those "groups" are still and also individual. All of these might be considered to be part of the point of the anthology — they are also presented much more subtly than my analysis suggests, hidden in poetry and the depictions of horrific conditions. (It is also the first of a selection of reprints scattered between the stories original to the anthology — most of the original publications of the reprints seem undeservedly obscure.)
By contrast, "Yahimba's Choice" is obvious and preachy in its point. The story buried under the sermon is good, and has twists I was not anticipating, and even a secondary theme is worth thinking about. But the story is crippled because every line screams "Female Circumcision is BAD!" A valid point. I agree with it. But I was more interested in Dossouye, in the Tarusi, in the story. Give the story first. The lesson should be a little quieter.
Cherene Sharrard's "The Quality of Sand" does just that. It involves pirate ships that target slavers, a free colony of the liberated prisoners. It involves jinn, and madness, and of course, sex. It makes its points, but the surface is adventure mixed with personal conflict.
I've made my admiration of Nalo Hopkinson clear elsewhere, so I will just say that "The Glass Bottle Trick" is an example of her finest short story form. It borrows from a folk tale more European in roots, but transplants it smoothly into the Caribbean, into one of the quieter kinds of racial conflict. The motivation of the villain of the piece, I have to say, is much more convincing to me than what little we are told in the original story.
"Recovery From a Fall" is possibly the strangest story present. It begins almost as a kind of seedy pornography, two people all too familiar with one another about to have sex for little reason but that the other is present. I mean pornography — there's little erotica here, just a fairly hard-core opening. The man is smoking drugs and his reactions to the world are all but autistic; the woman seems more annoyed than lusty. Then "Someone else gets involved" and it's another story entirely — still about three figures having sex, but suddenly, there's a purpose, a reason of literally world-changing proportions. Or there's supposed to be. The lead-in however, leaves me utterly unconvinced that the closing result could arise from that kind of a start. It's like reading two halves of two different stories. I could like the second story very much — if I ever have a chance to read the real first half of it.
The next three stories all include familiar figures — Peter Parker/Spiderman, a mighty-thewed blond warrior, and Jesus Christ, respectively — running head-on into cultural assumptions. The first two are short and light hearted, though Douglas Kearney's vignette is noticeably the better of the two for how it plays the clash, as Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu's "The Magical Negro" takes a satirical route as obvious as the kind of sword and sorcery plot he's ranting about.
W.E.B. DuBois's "Jesus Christ in Texas" was first published in 1920, and its age shows clearly in the language, and in certain assumptions the characters make. It still packs a nice wallop.
The next three stories — yes, I did just use that phrase two paragraphs ago. Most of the anthology seems to run in clusters of three. These three are set in Jazz clubs or Harlem streets, or a mix of both. Of these sets, the Harlem and Jazz is so far the most solid group of stories. Kevin Brockenbrough's " 'Cause Harlem Needs Heroes" is one of my favourite stories of the anthology, a future world of vampires, corrupt politics, and complicated but loving family resisting both enemies. I'm a sucker for stories about unusual kinds of family, especially when they involve the kind of rich background story and defiant battle against enemies more powerful but more evil.
The first science fiction story, John Cooley's "The Binary," is almost straight vigilante/assassin action, with a bit of anime feel. While there's a lot of action, it feels inconclusive, not as life feels inconclusive, but as a novel's opening chapter does. There is a novel excerpt in the anthology, but later, and clearly marked.
The next three science fiction stories seem to be an extrapolation — realistic or absurd — of a current political trend, and of that branch, only Jill Robinson's "BLACKout" seems to have any story besides the trend. Okay, one of the others involves sex, too — but even with the sex, I'm not sure it should be possible to sum up a whole story as "I applied for a grant."
Samuel R. Delany's "Corona" is also good enough to be worthy of note, but I suspect by his reputation that it's not his strongest endeavour.
The anthology closes with a set of three (there it is again) essays. The first is actually a free-flowing transcript of a science fiction convention panel — which I, as an unrepentant fiction lover, recommend as more riveting than many of the stories. The others are a memorial for Virginia Hamilton, a children's author (her wonderful African Rumplestiltskin, illustrated absolutely gorgeously by the Dillons, is on my shelf), and a thoughtful essay on Andre Norton's use of characters from minorities, or alien races, with sympathy and honesty.
If I had to follow the number trend and pick just three stories worth keeping form the anthology, they'd probably be Nalo Hopkinson's "The Glass Bottle Trick," Douglas Kearney's "Anansi Meets Peter Parker at the Taco Bell on Lexington," and Kevin Brockenbrough's "'Cause Harlem Needs Heroes." But this time, the numbers don't work. I'd want to pick more.
A final note. I almost didn't want to address this issue, but it is the elephant in the room, and ignoring it doesn't make it any less big, and whiskery, or make those tusks go away. That is, the political purpose of the anthology.
Invariably, when something like the Dark Matter series comes out — that is to say, an anthology based on a particular select group, be it racial, geographic, or something else — there's grumbling that it's exclusionary. There's also grumbling that this is the 21st century, stories by all these demographics are published in the big-name magazines, they don't need their own anthology.
The proof, however, is in the reading.
On one level, these stories are like other stories I've read; some are too preachy, some too long for their point, some too disjointed. All the story flaws have familiar names. The technical aspects are not better or worse than they are in short fiction everywhere. The anthology has great stuff, and forgettable stuff, and just plain muddled selections. On that level, these stories are like stories everywhere.
But it's not the perspective we're used to in Science Fiction or Fantasy. There are cultures and minorities here that have had very little say in speculative fiction until recently. To some, this is a breath of relief — finally, some of the stories in a collection like this will speak to them personally, will reflect their point of view. To some, like me, it will be a delightful opportunity to look through someone else's eyes again, flaws and all. To some it may be their first chance. The world isn't so multicultural yet that the political purpose of a book like Dark Matter is unnecessary. We're human enough it will probably never be unnecessary.
But I still hope that people looking at this book pick it up first and foremost for the sake of the individual favourite authors contained inside, for interest in a good story well told, for good word of mouth. There's plenty to like here.
