Great Reads
Fiction fills me with wonder, possibilities, truth, wisdom, beauty, hope. Following are books I commend to you. Some of my all-time favorites stay at the top of the list, particularly solarpunk:
- A Half-Built Garden by Ruthanna Emrys is one of the best solarpunk books I’ve read. Keeping at top of list!
- Land Marks by Maryann Lesert is an excellent example of speaking truth through fiction. The powerful story evokes a visceral connection with the land, making the characters’ actions against fracking all the more impactful. I love the direct actions the characters undertake to thwart extraction.
- The End of the Ocean by Maja Lunde is set in the fjordes of Norway as humans cause the destruction of aquifers and waterways. A call to climate action!
- The Lost Coast by AR Capetta “spellbinding tale of six queer witches forging their own paths, shrouded in the mist, magic, and secrets of the ancient California redwoods.”
- Gold Fame Citrus by Claire Vaye Watkins is a haunting tale once unrelenting drought transfigured Southern California into a surreal landscape who reads as a living being. Explores the myths we believe about others and ourselves, and the shape of hope in a precarious future that may be our own. Chilling.
- The Lost Cause by Cory Doctorow offers some actionable solarpunk for our current world. A lot of dialogue and philosophizing amidst a feasible storyline to in-fill urban areas to accommodate climate refugees and build resilient communities.
- Blood Sisters by Vanessa Lillie is an award-winning, page-turning thriller that highlights Indigneous justice and the plight of Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women, Girls, and Two-Spirits. Vanessa is an enrolled citizen of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma.
- Sordidez by E.G. Condé is a wonderful Taino/Indigenous Futurist read where Indigenous folx survive and ultimately reclaim their lands from settler-colonists. Shows what’s truly important in the world.
- Weird Fishes by Rae Mariz is eco- and climate fiction at its best from nonhuman views including cephalopods, sea mammals, and coral. Incorporates science and Indigenous lore
- Another Life by Sarena Ulibarri is an excellent solarpunk novella by an author-anthologist who has helped shape solarpunk
- The Memory Librarian by Janelle Monáe et al is Afrofuturistism exploring different threads of liberation–queerness, race, gender plurality, and love. A wonderful, thought-provoking set of connected stories!
- When We Hold Each Other Up by Phoebe Wagner is another wonderful solarpunk novella by an author-anthologist who has helped shape the genre and movement
- The Terraformers by Annalee Newitz is an excellent solarpunk read: who is a person? how might we create regenerative, mutual societies?
- The Fifth Sacred Thing and sequel City of Refuge by Starhawk are classic solarpunk from before we called it that