I remembering hating Wild Seed when I read it as a young(er) wannabe writer. I couldn’t put it down, though. The problem was, Wild Seed had some elements that were close to an idea I had for a script at the time — except way better. It happens to most people (“I had an idea to do a show about a psychic lawyer years ago…”), but the worst is to witness someone else executing that idea way better than you could ever dream of.
Wild Seed is still one of the few books that stand as a fencepost to what I’d like to reach with my own storytelling. Octavia Butler seamlessly wove race and history into a kick-ass story about immortals, love and power. She was one of the first black writers that made me realize incorporating identity and culture into a story doesn’t mean you have to give up strong narrative (it should actually be the opposite), and that sci-fi can be as black as it wants to be, dammit.
You’ll be missed, Ms. Butler. I still have that damn book on my shelf — time to torture myself and re-read it.
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