Other times, I felt her triumph as I watched her find her strength again and again. I held my breath when it called for it because her grief was heavy and troubling. Completely alone with only her tribe knowledge and the intellect, and she has to be her own hero. We meet Binti as she makes the hardest decision of her life, and therefore, every decision after that is equally as important.

Okorafor’s writing and the story of Binti reminded me that my place in the world may have trials to pass, but how I respond to them shows my strength. Can Binti to save herself and possibly countless others by the time her ship docks at its destination? Oomza University, the most prestigious school in the galaxy, offers her their highly sought out education due to her brilliance as a young mathematician. She would be the first of her nation to attend, leaving behind the only world she knows. No one in the port or on the shuttle is like her at all, and she is completely alone. Then the unspeakable happens on her transport ship, placing her in the middle of a war her people were never a part of. Through first person narration, we accompany the title character Binti as she begins her journey into an unfamiliar place. Obsession would be an accurate way to put it and I read all 85 pages before the sun had gone down. I wandered around the house with this book in my hand the entire day, moving from room to room whenever I was interrupted. I didn’t expect to finish Binti so quickly, especially since my responsibilities are a little more pressing than they use to be.

In 2016 alone, her novella Bintiwon both a Hugo (2016) and a Nebula (2015). Note: In my quest to purchase a copy, I had to drive 45 minutes to the closest location that had ONE in stock, the ONLY copy of an award winning book within 150 miles of a major metropolitan. She is a college professor in New York state and she holds a long list of awards for a number of her works. One of the biggest names in Afrofuturism is Nigerian-American Nnedi Okorafor (pronounced Neh-dee Oh-core-ra-for).

Binti okorafor