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Nalo Hopkinson
Nalo Hopkinson was born in Jamaica and grew up there, Trinidad, and Guyana, moving to Canada when she was 16. Of her writing she says, “I use Afro-Caribbean spirituality, oral history, culture and language in my stories, but place my characters within the idioms and setting of contemporary science fiction/fantasy. I see it as subverting the genre, which speaks so much about the experience of being alienated, but contains so little writing by alienated people themselves.” A Clarion graduate, Nalo, has been awarded ten grants for her work—including a recent Ontario Art Council Foundation Award—and won the 1997 Warner Aspect First Novel contest and the 2002 World Fantasy Award for her short story collection Skin Folk. Her short stories appeared in Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling’s anthology Black Swan, White Raven (Avon ‘97) and their Silver Birch, Blood Moon anthology (Avon).
Fantasy Novels:
Brown Girl in the Ring USA: Warner tp July 1998
*Winner: 1997 Warner Aspect First Novel contest
*Second printing prior to publication!
*Seventh Printing, January 2006
*Locus Trade Bestseller List
*Now Bestseller List (#9)
*1998 Locus Recommended Reading List
*Winner: Locus Award, Best First Novel
*Winner: John W. Campbell Award *Philip K. Dick Award Nominee
*B&N Maiden Voyage Award Nominee
*New York Public Library Books for the Teen
Age, 1999
*Quality Paperback Book Club selection, June ’00
*Black Expressions Book Club
*Canada Reads finalist 2007/8
France: J’ai Lu
Poland: Zysk I S-Ka
China: Muses Publishing
Midnight Robber USA: Warner March 2000
*Quality Paperback Bookclub Selection, June ’00
*Black Expressions Bookclub
*Locus 2000 Recommended SF Reading List
*Young Adult Library Services Association Nominee Best Book
*NY Times Notable Book of the Year, 2000
*Nebula Award Nominee, Best Novel, 2001
*Philip K. Dick Award Nominee, 2001
*Tiptree Award Short List Nominee 2000
* Hugo Nominee 2001, Best Novel
*Sunburst Nominee 2001, Best Fantastic Novel
*Now Bestseller List (#9)
Poland: Zysk I S-Ka
Spain: La Factoria de Ideas
Italy: Mondadori
China: Muses Publishing
The Salt Roads USA: Warner hc Nov. ’03
tp Nov. ’04 – lead slot
*2004 Nebula Award nominee
*2004 Sunburst Award Honorable Mention
*2004 Gaylactic Spectrum Award winner, Best Novel
The New Moon’s Arms USA: Warner hc Feb. ‘07
*Winner Sunburst Award, Best Novel
*Aurora Award (Canadian Hugo) nominee
*Nebula Award nominee
*BBC Audiobooks America audio edition
*SF Site.com’s #7 Best Book of 2007
Sister Mine USA: Hachette hc Mar 2013
*Dreamscape audio edition
*Amazon SF/Fantasy pick-of-the-month list
*PW Top 10 SF/Fantasy list Spring 2013
Young Adult
The Chaos USA: S&S/Margaret McElderry Books hc 2009
Starred Review- Kirkus (March 2012)
*Locus 2012 Recommended Reading List
Short Story Collections:
Skin Folk Warner Books Trade Dec 2001
*The Best Science Fiction Novels 2001 –SF Chronicle
*Golden Pen Award nominee
*World Fantasy Award winner, 2002
*Nominated for the Sunburst Award
Anthologies:
Whispers from the Cotton Tree Root: Invisible Cities Press, Oct. 2000
Caribbean Fabulist Fiction *Locus 2000 Recommended Reading List
*Three Short List Nominees for the Tiptree Award
*Best Books of 2000, Vermont Book Professionals Association
*World Fantasy Award nominee, Best Anthology
Mojo: Conjure Stories Warner Books Trade April 2003
*Black Expressions Book Club selection
So Long Been Dreaming: Arsenal Pulp Press, May 2005
Postcolonial Science Fiction and Fantasy
Praise for Nalo Hopkinson:
[ Whispers from the Cotton Tree] Combined with [Midnight Robber], . . .confirm the promise of her award-winning first novel, Brown Girl in the Ring – indeed a brilliant new star is rising.
-Locus, Faren Miller
Reviews:
BROWN GIRL IN THE RING
“Brown Girl in the Ring is a wild story, colorful and enthralling, exotically weird and at the same time totally convincing; you don’t read this book, you live in it--and though it’ll chase you across some scary landscapes, you’ll be sorry to go home again when you put it down.”
- Tim Powers, Philip K. Dick award winning author of Expiration Date
“I’ve been telling people about Nalo Hopkinson’s book...it is great.
-Octavia E. Butler, author of Parable of the Sower
“Not your average urban fantasy, not your average science fiction story, not your average fantasy, but with something of all three, Caribbean folklore in a city of the conceivable future. Unusual and intriguing in concept...with all the payoffs you hope for in a story. Plus command of craft...swinging into and out of dialect and all in a mature style. I think Nalo Hopkinson has real promise as a writer.”
-C.J. Cherryh, author of Fortress in the Eye of Time
“Brown Girl in the Ring marks the debut of a brilliant new voice in contemporary fantasy and science fiction. This is a powerful tale of powerful women dances on the border between fantasy and science fiction...A fascinating book that offers a unique perspective on the future.
-Pat Murphy, Nebula Award winning author of Rachel in Love
“Utterly original...the debut of a major talent. Gripping, memorable, and beautiful.”
-Karen Joy Fowler, author of Sarah Canary and The Sweetheart Season
The principal value of this book is the wonderful language; a spectacular construction of Afro-Caribbean magic. The story is simple: an extended family (including spirits and ghosts) against a gangster posse in a future Toronto, which has become an economically collapsed island of despair. The plot is by turn magically delightful and grimly violent and frightening. I hope I won't be giving away too much by saying that the ending is a happy one, not without a few ironic surprises.
-Lutterell’s Bookshelf 20th Century Books
The musical rhythms of Caribbean voices and the earthy spirit-magic of obean knit together this unusual fantasy, the first winner of Warner Aspect’s First Novel Contest...Hopkinson’s writing is smooth and assured, and her characters lively and believable. She has created a vivid world of urban decay and startling, dangerous magic, where the human heart is both a physical and metaphorical key.
-Publishers Weekly
This fine book balances a well-crafted and imaginative story with incisive social critique and a vivid sense of place. Hopkinson is a writer of great promise who, like Samuel R. Delaney and Octavia E. Butler, forces us to consider how inequities of race, gender, class and power might be played out in a dystopian future.
-The News Magazine of Black America
I must say up front that this is not your ordinary science fiction book, and I absolutely loved it! It’s fresh and full of character. . .Congratulations to Nalo Hopkinson, not only for the publication of a great first novel, but also for winning the Warner Aspect First Novel Contest!
-Explorations
Winner of the first Warner Aspect First Novel Contest for new sf and fantasy writers, Jamaican-born Hopkinson’s exotically imaginative debut is just realistic enough.
-Booklist
Genuinely unique…presented in a voice at once highly original and genre-savvy.
Brown Girl in the Ring...is an impressive, energetic, and highly original debut from a writer worth watching.
-Locus
Hopkinson’s debut novel is the premier winner of the Warner Aspect First Novel Contest. Future winners have a high standard to match. Part horror novel, part SF and part dark fantasy, it blends genres with a deftness which can escape more experienced hands.
-Mysterious Galaxy
The winner of the Warner Aspect First Novel Contest is a bright, original mix of future urban decay and West Indian Magic. Hopkinson creates a gritty future of urban decay. The science fiction is smoothly combined with zombie horror, creating an excellent first novel strongly rooted in character and place.
-Denver Post
…packaged with glowing testimonials from estimable science fiction writers like C.J. Cherryh, Tim Powers, and Octavia C. Butler. I am happy to report that Hopkinson lives up to her advance billing.
-New York Times
...Brown Girl is an impressive debut precisely because of Hopkinson’s fresh viewpoint.
-Washington Post
The winner of Warner’s Aspects first novel contest is a bracing work of imaginative fiction. . . Brown Girl in the Ring is an inventive work worthy of a large audience.
-Sci-Fi Universe
. . .What makes this novel a success is Hopkinson’s depiction of a resourceful and resilient girl, Ti-Jeanne, moving into adulthood. This heroine’s coming-of-age in the mean streets of riot-ruined Toronto may be one of the toughest ever. . . Ti-Jeanne’s courageous, spirited response to these challenges makes this first novel a book to remember.
-Cleveland Plain Dealer
“Nalo Hopkinson’s first novel, Brown Girl in the Ring, is simply triumphant.”
-Dorothy Allison, author of Bastard Out of Carolina
. . . Innovative and entertaining . . .the plot has enough twists and surprises to keep the reader guessing until the end. . . Butler is one of the best in the field, and there’s a touch of her style in Brown Girl. With more novels like this one, Hopkinson will join her at that level.
-Halifax Daily News
...A convincing social commentary and a fast-paced struggle between good and evil conducted through Afro-Caribbean spiritualism.
-Herrons
MIDNIGHT ROBBER
Joining distinguished African-American science fiction writers Octavia E. Butler and Samuel R. Delaney, Nalo Hopkinson brings a fresh multicultural voice to the genre with Midnight Robber. . .
-Publishers Weekly, (December 13, 1999)
Like its predecessor, this novel bears evidence that Hopkinson owns one of the more important and original voices in SF.
-Publishers Weekly, (stared review -- January 3, 2000)
...A deeply satisfying resolution...Hopkinson’s narrative voice has a way of getting under the skin, like a nanotech interface. Long after putting the book down, I would catch myself phrasing thoughts in what I came to call Tan-Tan talk. As the narrator herself puts it, ‘One look in she eyes, and you fall for she already.’
-New York Times Book Review
Drawn from the rich heritage of Afro-Caribbean culture, this novel explores colorful motifs such as the Robber Queen, Carnivale celebrations, artificial intelligences called eshus, aliens called douens, and the community of exiles. Like her first novel Brown Girl in the Ring, this one employs creole dialect to make the local color come alive. Language fans will just love the results. Readers with Afro-Caribbean heritage of their own should enjoy the total-immersion effect of a story with no fair-skinned main characters or overworked motifs from European folklore. Midnight Robber promises and delivers one heck of a wild ride. Highly recommended.
-Spicy Green Iguana
“Nalo Hopkinson makes me think of people like James Tiptree Jr., Roger Zelazny, Theodore Sturgeon and Keri Hulme; she's that good. She cooks up West Indian science fiction--a new subgenre we've needed badly for at least fifty years, a gumbo both spicy and nutritious. MIDNIGHT ROBBER is one of those books it's almost impossible NOT to read aloud to your loved ones--even rarer, one they won't mind listening to, because it's so damn musical, and such an engaging story. I will remember Tan-Tan the Robber Queen for a long time. Ms. Hopkinson won the John W Campbell Award for Best New Writer, and is clear proof there has been no decline in the quality of Campbell winners since, say, 1974. Don't miss this remarkable mako jumbie of a book.”
--Spider Robinson
...Impressive...Tan-Tan’s adventures are always clear and entertaining and the myths and legends never smother the SF elements. Midnight Robber makes me want to read more Caribbean literature, but more importantly, it makes me want to read more Nalo Hopkinson.
--Space.com
Hopkinson does an excellent job of transplanting Afro-Caribbean mythology and social traditions to an otherworldly environment...the dialogue positively crackles with the verbal energy...Midnight Robber demonstrates conclusively that she is a major SF talent.
--Quill & Quire
...A wonderfully original story...Midnight Robber confirms Hopkinson’s place as a provocative, intelligent voice in contemporary SF.
--The Globe and Mail
...Hopkinson creates another captivating story set in a richly imagined world...rich with elements of fantasy, science fiction, and magic realism. The author populates her novel with fascinating characters and intriguing descriptions of the advanced technology.
--Voya
"There is every reason to believe that Nalo Hopkinson's second novel will receive the same acclaim that followed the release of her stunning debut... With MIDNIGHT ROBBER, Hopkinson shows what is possible when one uses elements of life, blended with fantasy and imagination, to fashion speculative fiction with heart, soul, and sass."
-Robert Fleming, Black Issues Book Review
Nalo Hopkinson is tough on her protagonists, but she brings them through their trials in a wonderfully evocative, energetic, explosive language that is wholly new to speculative fiction, and that marks her as an exciting new voice in our literature. Like Brown Girl in the Ring, her award-winning first novel, Midnight Robber puts a young woman through a trial by fire we only want to read about. But what a marvellous reading experience she offers, with narrators whose Afro-Caribbean dialect creates a modern epic music full of dancing rhythms…In both her moral vision and her poetic style, Nalo Hopkinson has already achieved something new and special in Canadian writing and SF. Midnight Robber confirms her orignality and offers readers a colorful palette of delights.
-Edmonton Journal
This book could change a whole heapa thangs in the world of speculative fiction…And all I can do is chuckle wickedly, knowing that Nalo Hopkinson’s Midnight Robber has royally screwed with the playing field. SF ain’t a (mostly) white, western, straight boyz game no more.
-Now Magazine
…a refreshing, well-written change in the sci-fi/fantasy genre..
-Newsday, Trinidad
The language is a treat for the ears and tongue…another impressive literary work.
-Daily Gleaner
Caribbean science fiction? Nalo Hopkinson is staking her claim as one of its most notable authors…Hopkinson enriches the tale with her ability to turn the mythology of the Caribbean into what is sometimes a delightful vision of Eden and, at other times, an inter-planetary chamber of tropical horrors.
-Caribbean Travel and Life
WHISPERS FROM THE COTTON TREE ROOT
The mix of well-known contemporary authors (Jamaica Kincaid, Kamau Brathwaite), distinguished writers from an earlier wave of Caribbean fiction (Wilson Harris, Antonio Benitex-Rojo) and many new-comers results in a rich and varied volume. The book should also gain some readers from the SF/fantasy market, given its subject matter and Hopkinson’s strong reputation in the SF field.