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Book Cover for: Everfair, Nisi Shawl

Everfair

Nisi Shawl

Critic Reviews

Good

Based on 7 reviews on

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From acclaimed short fiction writer Nisi Shawl comes a brilliant alternate history set in the Congo, where heroes strive for a Utopia and endeavor to live together despite their differences.

Now with a beautiful new cover and a foreward from award-winning author Cadwell Turnbull.

In this re-imagining of Belgium's disastrous colonization of the Congo, African American missionaries join forces with British socialists to purchase land from the Congo Free State's "owner," King Leopold II. This land, which they name Everfair, is set aside as a safe haven for native populations of the Congo as well as settlers from around the world, including dream-eyed Europeans attempting to create a better society, formerly enslaved people returning from America, and Chinese railroad builders escaping hard labor. Using the combined knowledge of four continents, Everfair becomes a land of spying cats and gulls, nuclear dirigibles buoyed by barkcloth balloons, and silent pistols that shoot poison knives.

With this technology, Everfair will attempt to defeat the Belgian tyrant Leopold II. But even if they can defeat their great enemy, a looming world war and political infighting may threaten to destroy everything they have built.

"A book with gorgeous sweep, spanning years and continents, loves and hates, histories and fantasies... Everfair is sometimes sad, often luminous, and always original. A wonderful achievement." -- Karen Joy Fowler

Book Details

  • Publisher: Tor Books
  • Publish Date: Jun 13rd, 2023
  • Pages: 384
  • Language: English
  • Edition: undefined - undefined
  • Dimensions: 8.20in - 5.30in - 1.10in - 0.70lb
  • EAN: 9781250212313
  • Categories: • Alternative History• Science Fiction - Steampunk• Fantasy - Historical

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About the Author

Shawl, Nisi: - Nisi Shawl (they/them) is a multiple award-winning writer and editor of science fiction, fantasy, and horror. They're the author of Everfair and co-author of Writing the Other: Bridging Cultural Differences for Successful Fiction. Other recent titles include Speculation, a middle-grade historical fantasy; a new volume of the acclaimed New Suns anthologies; and the story collection Our Fruiting Bodies.

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Critics’ reviews

Praise for this book

"A beautifully written and thrillingly ambitious alternate history . . . It's a tribute to Shawl's powerful writing that her intricate, politically and racially charged imaginary world seems as believable--sometimes more believable--than the one we inhabit."--The Washington Post

"Nisi Shawl's Everfair is a book with gorgeous sweep, spanning years and continents, loves and hates, histories and fantasies. Set against the big canvas of King Leopold's horrific rule in the Congo, her engaging, passionate characters struggle to make the right choices in a world that is almost ours, but not quite. Everfair is sometimes sad, often luminous, and always original. A wonderful achievement."--Karen Joy Fowler

"From the exotic, baroque complexities of 'At the Huts of Ajala' to the stark, folktale purity of 'The Beads of Ku, ' these fourteen superbly written stories will weave around you a ring of dark, dark magic."--Ursula K. Le Guin on Filter House