Kindred by Octavia E. Butler; narrated by Kim Staunton | 2007; originally published 1979 | Recorded Books | Audiobook $ 25.55
Having just celebrated her birthday in 1976 California, Dana, an African-American woman, is suddenly and inexplicably wrenched through time into antebellum Maryland. After saving a drowning White boy there, she finds herself staring into the barrel of a shotgun and is transported back to the present just in time to save her life. During numerous such time-defying episodes with the same young man, she realizes the challenge she’s been given: to protect this young slaveholder until he can father her own great-grandmother.
Octavia E. Butler consistently appears on must-read lists of speculative fiction books, and she has unsurprisingly been the recipient of a great many awards and other forms of recognition, such as having things like asteroids and other items in outer space officially named after her.
Kindred is her earliest stand-alone novel. It’s a time travel sci-fi or portal fantasy featuring a Black woman protagonist set alternately in the antebellum South and the post- Civil Rights Movement, mid- 2nd Wave Feminism 1970’s. This entire concept is basically my catnip, so I had to have it on my to-read list! I’ve been looking forward to reading it for ages.
I think this story appealed to me in part because of my ongoing interest in family history. If you’ve had family in this country, particularly in the South, since before the 1860’s, you’re going to have to eventually deal with the impact that chattel slavery unavoidably had on their lives. It’s often impossible to know for sure how specifically our ancestors dealt with that peculiar institution, either as slaves or slaveholders or as other people navigating a slavery-based economic system and culture, or what they personally thought about it… but you can’t help but wonder. This story provides an incredibly sharp-yet-nuanced perspective to that kind of speculation.
I will say that the writing style of this one suffered a little in comparison to some of the more captivating prose of the other novels and nonfiction books that were on my desk or in my speakers around the same time. The plot is fast-paced and the character + relationship developments are compelling, which made up for that in my opinion. It’s just worth mentioning that the writing style is more like what you’d expect from a late-midcentury spec fic zine short story than a typical contemporary fantasy full-length novel.
I would recommend this book to folks who enjoy time travel sci-fi or portal fantasy, of course, but also to people who have an interest in historical fiction set in pre- Civil War America from the point of view of someone other than Scarlett O’Hara.
Links:
- Official website of Octavia E. Butler
- Biography of Octavia E. Butler from the National Women’s History Museum
- “Octavia E. Butler: Telling My Stories” exhibit from The Huntington Library
Publication information: Butler, Octavia E. Kindred. Landover, Maryland: Recorded Books, 2008. Audiobook.
Source: Public library, via Hoopla.
Disclaimer: I am not compensated, monetarily or otherwise, for reviews of books or other products.