The narrator, Anwuli Okwudili (who sometimes tells people that her initials AO also stand for Autobionic Organism), is a cyborg, enhanced by powerful prosthetics, both as the result of birth defects and of a ‘‘rare automated-vehicle accident’’ suffered as a teenager. Noor, which depending on how you count is only her fourth full-length adult novel (though I’d argue the YA label on some of her best work is often arbitrary), is set almost entirely in northern Nigeria, though it’s a Nigeria which, like much of the world, is largely transformed by an international megacorporation rather unsubtly called Ultimate Corp, whose global tentacles make Amazon look like a neighborhood shop.

Okorafor has also become one of the most prominent American proponents of Africanfuturism, an SFnal expression of lived African experience and culture (as opposed to Afrofuturism, which often focuses on diaspora cultures). In The Shadow Speaker, Okorafor uses the term ‘‘metahuman’’ for such figures. But biographical criticism can only take us so far, and it’s equally true that the figure of the outsider with special powers, sometimes persecuted because of them, is one of SF’s longstanding traditions – it even has its own entry in the SF Encyclopedia (‘‘Pariah Elite,’’ a term coined by Roz Kaveney). Those who have read or heard Okorafor’s moving and personal TED talk (published as Broken Places & Outer Spaces) probably have some ideas as to why this theme is so important in her work, as well as why so many of the above characters are outsiders, sometimes even in their own cultures.

Zahrah the Windseeker finds that her dreadlocks give her the power to levitate and fly Ejii in The Shadow Speaker learns she can hear at great distances and even read minds Onyesonwu in Who Fears Death? not only discovers an explosive psychic power at her father’s funeral, but becomes a shapeshifter Sunny the Akata Witch learns she’s a rare ‘‘free agent’’ among the Leopard People Phoenix in The Book of Phoenix can basically incinerate and resurrect herself Binti finds she’s a ‘‘harmonizer’’ who can work with aliens Fatima in Remote Control gains powers literally over life and death, becoming a legendary figure named Sankofa. Noor, Nnedi Okorafor ( DAW 978-0756416096, $23.99, 224pp, hc) November 2021.Īs vibrant and inventive as her settings are, Nnedi Okorafor’s most consistent theme may simply be the discovery of unexpected inner powers.

Nnedi okorafor noor