That’s not supposed to happen, right?
December 20, 2016 4:19 PM   Subscribe

"The Venus Effect" by Joseph Allen Hill is "a story of stories, a metafictional experience that sees the narrator seeking to create a story where the main character can take part in big SFF adventures and not, well…not get shot by police."

The pull quote is from a review by Charles Payseur:
To me it's a critique on escapism, because for some there is no escape for their situation. For some there is no safety and whatever bad happens to them they will still be blamed for it, will always be asked to sympathize and empathize with their abusers and killers.
posted by Faint of Butt (16 comments total) 55 users marked this as a favorite
 
Damn.
posted by Myca at 5:00 PM on December 20, 2016


Brutal.
posted by tobascodagama at 5:40 PM on December 20, 2016


I might even go as far as savage,
posted by Samizdata at 6:59 PM on December 20, 2016


God this was awesome. Black lives matter.
posted by Made of Star Stuff at 8:27 PM on December 20, 2016


This is the best sff short story of the year, for me. I'm choked up here. Thanks for this.
posted by shmegegge at 10:30 PM on December 20, 2016 [2 favorites]


Yeah, that goes on my Hugo ballot for sure.
posted by Wobbuffet at 10:36 PM on December 20, 2016


Awesome. And terrible. Great sci-fi.
posted by Svejk at 1:04 AM on December 21, 2016


Definitely a Hugo contender. I happily (well, wasn't exactly happy after reading it) dropped the $3.99 for the full issue after finishing - worth it for that story alone. Thanks.
posted by Roommate at 6:37 AM on December 21, 2016


I'm glad to hear you all appreciated this story as much as I did, so I'll add a plug: If you dig racially conscious SFF, you'll want to read Lightspeed's special issue People of Colo(u)r Destroy Science Fiction!, as well as its sister issues People of Colo(u)r Destroy Fantasy! (which, by sheer coincidence, contains the story from this neighboring post) and People of Colo(u)r Destroy Horror!.

Furthermore, I'll add the story "Super Duper Fly" by Maurice Broaddus, which blew my mind when I read it in the anthology Upside Down: Inverted Tropes in Storytelling and would be worthy of its own post.
posted by Faint of Butt at 7:58 AM on December 21, 2016 [3 favorites]


The story left me conflicted. It seemed like a well-told anxiety attack, with the narrator always being able to find the same negative every time.

The thing is, I'm not sure that the focus is the best one to take. I'm worried that by emphasising one problem, the narrator may be making a bigger problem even larger.

The number of black people killed by police this year is very roughly 6.1 per million. (Source)

The number of black people in prison per capita in 2010 was about 23,000 per million. (Source).

Both numbers only tell part of the story of lives ruined, futures stolen, families broken.

The deaths are terrible and tragic, but the police killings are not the biggest part of the problem. Blacks in America are the victims of a continued, pervasive, and powerful intimidation campaign, and the killings are the tip of the iceberg, not its heart.

If you focus on the killings, and how unavoidable they are, and how there's nothing you can do, and there's no hope, and you shouldn't dream, (and oh, by the way, here's a different perspective), it seems to be reinforcing the message of intimidation. The kicker at the end is solid, but it doesn't seem to make the risks of dreaming seem any less real.

I don't know the right way to counter a country-wide system of intimidation and repression, but feeding the fear doesn't seem, to me, to be the it.
posted by YAMWAK at 7:59 AM on December 21, 2016


I'll add another vote for POC Destroy Fantasy. I saw N.K. Jemison read an early draft of Red Dirt Witch and it was amazing. She said it still needed work, but I think she was the only person in the room who believed that. I am excited to see how she improved on it.

As for this story, all I can say is that it's going on my Hugo ballot. Maybe not quite my favorite, but definitely in the top 3.
posted by Hactar at 8:38 AM on December 21, 2016 [2 favorites]


YAMWAK, are you really going to do the thing where you want one story to fix an entire problem? Where you want to tell one artist of color how to do their thing?

The fear doesn't need feeding. It is already at maximum, in my experience.

The story speaks the fear; I don't know how to disconnect the tip of this iceberg from its heart -- it is ice, truly, all the way down, and must be spoken and chipped at in all the ways.

Thanks so much for this post!
posted by allthinky at 9:13 AM on December 21, 2016 [3 favorites]


FoB, thanks for the links to the Lightspeed issues.
posted by BlueHorse at 9:32 AM on December 21, 2016 [2 favorites]


I'm not trying to tell any artist, of any colour, how to do their thing, but I am talking about their thing from my perspective, same as everyone else.

I agree that the iceberg should be chipped at in all the ways, but this story seems, to me, to argue that chipping away at the iceberg is too risky. I don't know if there's anywhere to go from there.
posted by YAMWAK at 11:40 AM on December 21, 2016


I think your approach to this work is fundamentally flawed. I'm not sure you understand what it's doing or what it's trying to do in the least.
posted by tobascodagama at 1:06 PM on December 21, 2016 [1 favorite]


Yeah, you might be right, or else I can't communicate my thoughts clearly enough. Either way I'll bow out now.
posted by YAMWAK at 1:12 PM on December 21, 2016


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