Broken Places & Outer Spaces

I love Okorafor's fiction, and was always curious to learn more about her life, so I was thrilled to get the chance to read this memoir. Short and powerful.

“The world breaks everyone and afterward many are strong at the broken places”—Ernest Hemingway<br /><br />A short memoir by Afro-futurist science fiction writer and Chicagoan Nnedi Okorafor (Akata Warrior, Binti, The Shadow Speaker, and also writing comics for Marvel out of the Black Panther universe) who writes of Africa, science and technology, strange creatures, with magical realism and strong black feminist commitments, with strong young black women main characters who overcome adversity. And what are the sources for her writing? In this short memoir we learn that the promising athlete and wannabe entomologist Okorafor was diagnosed with scoliosis at 13, was paralyzed (for a time) from the waist down during corrective surgery. <br /><br />During the time she was (kind of miraculously) recovering, she was visited by morphine-induccd hallucinations of bugs, and began to take notes in the margins of science fiction books that would emerge as her early novels. The theme and trajectory of the suffering-to-success story is not a new one, which she admits, liking her sown tory to others such as Frida Kahlo and Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, but she makes the point that she would never have become a writer had she not faced this adversity.<br /><br />Okorafor connects this time in her life to the stories she has now written of girls who overcome challenges to not only walk but fly, and travel in space, excel in science and magic. And who love weird bugs and creatures. Also she tells of visiting Nigeria, and being inspired by her ancestors and family who have supported her along the way in various ways. I know this work is very short, but it is now one of my favorite works from her because of the specific links from her life to her work.<br /><br />The 9-minute TED talk that is related to this (much-expanded) book but less autobiographical, more Afro-Futurist:<br /><br /><a target="_blank" rel="noopener nofollow" href="https://www.ted.com/talks/nnedi_okorafor_sci_fi_stories_that_imagine_a_future_africa">https://www.ted.com/talks/nnedi_okora...</a><br /><br />

This was a combined personal history of Nnedi Okorafor's paralysis, an account of the discrimination she received due to the colour of her skin, and a hopeful message on how to persevere through the dark times and use them as your fuel to greatness.<br /><br />I really liked the format for this short autobiographic piece. Snippets from Okorafor's time in hospital are interspersed with segments from her early years, before the reader gets to journey through to her eventual progression beyond these times.<br /><br />Despite being deeply personal, this also conveyed a long-lasting message for any reader to take away, and I found much to personally connect to on the themes of creativity.

I considered not leaving a review for this one but the more I read the 5 star reviews the more I feel like it's necessary for me to express what upset me about this book.<br />I'm physically disabled and owe a lot to online disability communities. They helped me understand the social model of disability, which comes down to the idea that "people are disabled by barriers in society, not by their impairment or difference." It does not seem like Nnedi Okorafor subscribes to this same way of thinking.<br />She uses terms like "wheelchair-bound" which are offensive to wheelchair users. Wheelchairs are not something a person is "trapped" in, but rather a tool that gives people freedom. I use a wheelchair whenever I have awful pain days or need to travel long distances, and it has made my life so much easier and made many places accessible to me that would not have been before.<br />She also references media that involves wheelchair users/disabled characters that are "cured" from their disability, and views them in a positive light. In Avatar, the main character is a wheelchair user that is shown to despise his chair and his body. When he is able to take over a different, abled body, this is pictured as his dream come true, as his "freedom". This media trope is very upsetting to wheelchair users and other disabled people.<br />If you ask a lot of disabled people if they would choose to get rid of their disability, they would say no. Many people are born with their disabilities, and have had their entire life shaped by their condition. They would not be the same person if they were not disabled, so wishing it away would be wishing away a core part of that person.<br />While Nnedi Okorafor is describing her own life and experiences, she does so in a way that I find troubling. I wish that she would be more involved in disabled communities and speak to other disabled people, as well as read up on the social model of disability. Her being a spokesperson for disability while actively using terms such as "wheelchair-bound" and championing narratives that erase disability from a person is upsetting because she is only appealing to a very narrow idea of disability.<br />Okorafor seems to almost "get" the idea that a person can be disabled and flourish from their disability when she talks about Frida Kahlo, but I feel this is lost amongst everything else she writes in this short book. If she wanted to make that the central topic of her work, she should have dug a little deeper to understand that people can be disabled in many different ways and use many different aids and still be happy and living their best life.

Some interesting thoughts on creativity but the book was way to short (112 pages) to develop any of them in depth.<br />2.5*

A quick and inspiring read. Okorafor's lush literary style is on full display, and every page packed a punch. It's not everyday you get such a brutally honest and intimate offering from one of your favorite authors, and not every author can produce nonfiction this lovely. I feel very privileged to have gotten to read this arc. It only cemented my certainty that Nnedi Okorafor is one of my favorite human beings on this planet.

This book speaks to me on so many levels. As a disabled woman who didn't receive a diagnosis until more than a decade after my health problems surfaced, it's been a process of looking back to see where and how my life changed--became broken and rearranged. Because Okorafor's disability occurs so suddenly and dramatically, she's able to make connections that I hadn't thought to make about myself. Despite my almost thirty years of living with this disability, I now see it differently. I highly recommend reading this slim memoir about finding creativity within a life-altering disability.

I love Nnedi Okorafor's novels and I found the same power of personality in this autobiography of her. A short, but powerful narration about the fact that sometimes being broken can be the beginning of something new and good. Very uplifting and in her wonderful raw and authentic voice.<br /><br />Now I'd love to go back to reading the Binti books and the Who Fears Death? books with this knowledge in my mind, seeing the autobiographical touch.

A Ted talk memoir of how the author coped with being paralyzed. <br /><br />Just based on her fiction, I knew Nnedi Okorafor was an amazing person. I enjoy her way of looking at living with a different slant, partially based on her background and visits with her family to Nigeria, and partially (I see now) due to the difficult fight she had to regain the use of her legs when a scoliosis surgery leaves her paralyzed. <br /><br />I don't feel the short Ted talk format let this memoir breathe enough to really reach a great place. This was more like the sharing of facts, with a bare outline of how it affected her. I didn't feel like I understood her in my gut, just my head. I was a little concerned by the implication that you need to be 'broken' in order to be able to grow stronger and be creative. <br /><br />One neat fact I got out of this is finally understanding 'treeing' (which shows up in her Binti novellas). Apparently it's a tennis term for heightened awareness, and refers to "...when you are playing out of your mind, when you can do no wrong, when you can make the universe yield to your every whim."<br />

Brief but beautifully written memoir about Nnedi Okafor’s paralysis after a scoliosis surgery gone wrong. It’s the story of her pivot from star athlete and premed student to science fiction writer (of what she calls “Africanfuturism”), how she discovered her own creativity and a new passion for science fiction after science failed her. Her powerful description of what it’s like to face this kind of “breaking” and the difficulty of learning how to walk again is intertwined with her story of becoming a writer, and all of it is very inspiring.