African-descended USians are finally obtaining reparations-underwater. Plunge into the action of a visionary future by the award-winning author of Everfair, with narration by LeVar Burton ( Star Trek: The Next Generation).
Five miles off the South Carolina coast, Darden and Catherina are getting their promised forty acres, all of it undersea. Like every Black "mer," they've been experimentally modified to adapt to their new subaquatic home-and have met with extreme resistance from white supremacists. Darden has an inspired plan for resolution. For both those on land and the webbed bottom-dwellers below, Darden is hoping to change the wave of the future.
Nisi Shawl's 2043 . . . (A Merman I Should Turn to Be) is part of Black Stars, a multi-dimensional collection of speculative fiction from Black authors. Each story is a world much like our own. Read or listen to them in a single sitting.
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Their last time on shore, they made sweet and salty love.
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(Amazon Original Stories, 31 August 2021, ebook, 31 pages, borrowed from @AmazonKindle, #PrimeReading)
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This is a new author for me. I really enjoyed 2043 A Merman I Should Turn to Be. I loved the concept of the story; immigrants being relocated underwater and genetically enhanced to make them able to live in their new 'homes'. There is something impressive yet equally creepy about this. This enhancement and the perceived freedom's that come with it get the red-necked locals all riled up. You can guess where this leads. I thought this was a powerful original tale.