"Womb City" by Tlotlo Tsamaase is an emotionally charged and anxiety-inducing journey that proves to be a rewarding read. The prose may hinder the narrative early on, but the overall impact of the story makes this a worthwhile read and a strong debut. Bravo!

Connecting with the main character, famed architect Nelah who lives in a criminal body, took longer than expected, even with shared experiences to pull on. The anticipated depth of emotional turmoil seems overshadowed by Nelah's inclination toward risk-taking as a coping mechanism while being so closely monitored. This recklessness, while propelling the plot forward toward the inevitable, spent too long on floundering one wouldn't expect from a resilient, incredibly intelligent character like Nelah. However, I truly enjoyed her latter development, and most importantly, her rage as she struggles against a system stacked against Black women.

Nelah's stream of consciousness serves as the primary narrative vehicle, demanding effort from the reader. The prose can be a bit of a challenge to navigate, requiring persistence to fully engage with the story.

The afro-dystopian concept presented is executed with thoughtfulness and care, adding a layer of depth to the narrative that is immersive without overwhelming. Tsamaase paints an evocative exploration of the culture and systems at play without overwhelming with description. A more vivid presentation could have enhanced the reader's experience, but would've detracted from the grittiness of the plot.

The final quarter of the book stands out for its balanced pacing and graceful resolution, bringing the narrative together cohesively. Despite its initial challenges, "Womb City" culminates in a satisfying manner that leaves me eager to see Tsamaase's future work.

I am still reading this, but I wanted to review before the archive date! So far I am really enjoying this. It's a fascinating dystopian world, with creepy parallels to our current situations. I am enjoying the main character, and am very interested to see how it progresses into something even darker.

(four stars only because I haven't finished so can't confirm)

I ended up DNFing this book, not because the writing is bad, its actually beautiful, but because I misunderstood what this book was about. I got it in my head that this was sci fi ghosts, and that might come later. It starts out with this woman's experiences with a deeply misogynistic society where her worth is determined by staying married and having a baby. Two things which I hate most in books. Honestly, the book is called WOMB city, and that should have been a huge clue that its about babies. I just got stuck on "ghosts" and didn't think anything more about it.

DNF after reading 50%. Too many good ideas rendered almost incomprehensible by too many characters, not enough straight narrative to explain. Very disappointed!

I really wanted to love Womb City, I really do. But unfortunately this wasn’t exactly my cup of tea.

I still think it’s a timely and poignant book. It’s about female bodies and the policing and agency of these bodies. These aspects really showed through and were handled very well. I think that’s what makes it an important read.

However, this wasn’t completely my thing. One, because this book just tried to be a little bit too much: thriller, horror, dystopian, fantasy, even a little literary fiction.

Two, the exposition was pretty complicated but also repetitive. It was mostly present in our MCs head and in dialogue, which read a little stunted and unnatural.

Three, the writing confused me. Sometimes it was good, sometimes I couldn’t make any sense of it. It was a very mixed bag. This mostly happened in like the surreal parts, the dream-like sequences. The author does have a distinct voice, which I did like.

All-in-all, not a bad book by any means, but it just wasn’t for me. I liked the themes and it explored those really well, but the execution wasn’t really my cup of tea.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.

"All the rules are there to protect them, but who protects us?"

Wow, 2024 is turning out some amazing titles and WOMB CITY by @tlotlotsamaase is no exception! TY to the author, @netgalley and the publisher @erewhonbooks for both the audio and e-ARCs! This book is like if Minority Report, THE HANDMAID'S TALE and Cabin in the Woods had a baby and I loved it so much that I am currently listening to it again after finishing the e-ARC initially!

This is an intricately weaved near-future sci-fi horror set in Botswana, where microchipping humans is commonplace, future crimes are predicted by an ancient entity with powerful blood, reincarnation is possible but results in amnesia, babies are made in Wombcubators, and everyone is terrified of the shadowy Murder Trials. Yeah, there is A LOT going on here and I am not mad about any of it. There is something for everyone here: romance, sci-fi, hope, healing, revenge, mystery, suspense, horror, but most importantly, the impetus to change toxic and harmful culture and traditions.

If you read this one, stay with all the up-front world-building because Tsamaase is going to take you on an incredible, brutal, bloody ride and she will do it while commenting on gender, class, government corruption, race, inheritance, trauma, the trafficking of bodies, police overreach, and the control of women's bodies. She got me reading about Nguni mythology and the history of the Bantu expansion in Southern Africa and has magically weaved this all into a wildly entertaining and heart-pumping story filled with beautiful prose alongside swearing like a sailor.

This book feels like the manifestation of the struggles and sins of our ancestors and includes the feminist, post-patriarchal, gender bending Messiah-like character of my dreams.

The audio is phenomenal as well, btw: shout out to narrator Christel Mutombo! Happy Birthday WOMB CITY! ALL THE STARS!!

Do you enjoy stories with complex world-building?

💚SMASHBOT💚

#bibliophile #wombcity #tlotlotsamaase #horrorbooks #scifibooks #africanfuturism #bookish #booknerd

“No matter how many lives you have, you’re still afraid of dying.”

“Womb City” felt genre bending. It was equal parts sci-if, horror, and literary fiction. Tsamaase uses colourful and sometimes lyrical prose to bring you into her version of Botswana. The protagonist is portrayed as both likeable and sometimes the opposite. Tsamaase’s ability to paint the picture of some of the more grotesque scenes was very vivid.

It touches on reincarnation, femicide, culture, and scientific advancements that are both terrifying and fascinating.

I am glad to have had the opportunity to read an advanced copy, thank you to Erewhon books!

Thank you NetGalley and Kensington Books for this early review copy! I would like to note while I gave this 3 stars, I'm lean more towards 3.5 stars which is how I will be rating it on StoryGraph.

I have mixed feelings on this book, which might partially be stemming from the fact that I'm not typically a Science Fiction reader. I do on the other hand love horror and mystery, which this book also was heavy in. The beginning of the book started off really slow for me, which I understand was a lot of it setting up the general setting and dystopian world, helping the reader understand how these people lived. And it did a great job of that, it was just a bit slow for me. All of a sudden it took a left turn and really picked up and suddenly got into the horror, which was is where I got hooked. I loved the whole middle of the book, with how creepy it was, and learning about the corrupt government and how it all built up to the end. Then once again, we got to the end and it started to really drag and slow down for me, but it had gotten back heavily into the SciFi part of the story. Overall it was truly a great book. I really enjoyed the world it was built around and the story that came from it (I wouldn't love to live in that world, but it made for a great book).

To start, thank you NetGalley for letting me recieve this Earc for early reviewing! No spoilers are below.


The premise of this book is incredibly interesting. It tackles many modern and topical social injustices that have plagued us as a species for what seems like, forever. These topic include feminism, motherhood and more specifically, one's fear and distant thoughts when it comes to being a mother and a parent, what it means to be a woman, and finding control in ones life when it seems we are destined by others' means and wants. Our main character is someone who is controlled through her husband's wants, as well as the society who respects men more than women.

I liked this book, but the writing was a little on the nose sometimes, with it's themes. I love stories that show me, not tell me. This was a heavy case of that. It is a lot of worldbuilding, so, for the sake of reading comprehension, perhaps the on-the-nose exposition was needed. I just thought it was a tad disinteresting at times. Overall, the story is good and interesting, I just feel the writing could improve, but, I would definitely read more by this author, as they obviously possess a beautiful imagination, and have a strong grasp on societal issues. The author wrote a complex main character very nicely, and even in their flaws, the character was very self-aware. That was refreshing. With that being said, there were a lot of beautiful lines in the form of isolating and loneliness-riddled thoughts from our main character. There is also some very bad lines. Like so: "dinner with the side-b*tch, and I'm the bad b*tch." It took me out severally sometimes. Another thing about the world-building, is that sometimes it was super complex and a bit confusing, but some of it was repetitive. Like. yeah, I understand THAT part, but WHAT is going on in that element of the story??

It could drag on a tad, but again, a lot of worldbuilding was needed. I enjoyed the science fiction through the lens of a feminine protagonist. Thoroughly enjoyable, just a lot to take in due to its genre, and the writing style was a little too modern, I guess. Some of the lines were clearly thought out and thought provoking, heartbreaking, even; some were lacking and felt like I was reading the plot from a text message. That's what I mean by "modern." It's not that it wasn't complex enough, it just wasn't immersive enough, and kind of bland. Perhaps that was intentional, to make the character seem more human, given her condition, and how that is a part of the plot, but it just felt a little flat to me at times. Which is a hard thing to get over, when you're supposed to be immersified into a science fiction novel that is over 400 pages.

A solid 3 out of 5 stars. I, as a person whose biggest fear is pregnancy, enjoyed reading the hestitantness of a character unsure of what they want from life, and relate to how she described some of her occurences with other characters when describing her distantness and apprehensiveness to bringing a child into the world. How, as a woman, we have to live with the notion that all our minds, bodies, and souls are only good for producing heirs, and how we have to grapple with ones biological urge to produce and be maternal, despite knowing we would not thrive in it? How we ourselves often wonder if that is all we are good for.

Important to note that I think the plot was really good. The idea of body hopping is an insane but very inviting concept. I just had to knock it down to 3 because again, some of those lines were very...cringey. The "bad b*tch" line that was mentioned above, really solidified that, and cause me to have a bit of a reading slump for the next few days after reading that one line. There's more like that throughout the book, but that one really rattled uncomfortably in my head for a long time. If I was a publisher, that one would have been edited out in the very first draft. Was it supposed to be meta? Was it supposed to show how our protagonist is not so unlike the other corrupt people she complains about? Surely, there were other phrases that would have gotten that message across, even though, it didn't really need to be said. We know she is with her side piece, we know the implications present. That's what I mean about "on-the-nose."

The novel essentially asks the questions: how do we make our mark on the world, as a simple woman, instead of being yet another mother? Do we need to be mothers to make a difference? Is it wrong to want more, especially in a world that does not take women seriously? In the same breath, is it wrong to not want more and to only be mothers? Why does the world force motherhood down our throats, only to *still* not take us seriously? Why do men often want multiple heirs, yet refuse to acknowledge how important a woman's role is in this world? Are children just currency and power plays in a world so capitalistic and focused on producing, that it doesn't even matter what is being produced, whether it be materials or children? Do we really want children, or do we often just want to be parents, to fill a void? If given the option, like in this futuristic society, would/ will you have willingly changed your children's personality, work ethic, and looks for more success, and would that benefit the child's or their parent's self esteem more? Will young girls ever be considered as equal in value and as full of potential as young boys? Will the government ever care about it's children as humans, or will they always care for the means of producing only the children that they deem worthy of a desired, functional society of their powerful influential making only? What makes a criminal, truly worthy of the label "criminal?"

Wow!!!!! This book blew me away!! Like seriously, I was not expecting the story to develop the way it did in this story, but I'm so happy that it did!!! Thank you to Netgalley, Kensington Books, Erewhon books, and Tlotlo Tsamasse for the e-arc and audio book of this fantastic novel.

Let me start by stating that I don't normally read horror books, and was automatically interested I this novel because of the sci-fi, dystopian description. However, the horror elements did not disturb me, but instead kept my gripped and racing to find out what was happening.

The author makes a lot of commentary on the social and legal state of womanhood within this dystopian society, that honestly also reflects on our curent world. "Besides, women are so used to sacrificing and losing parts of themselves from bodies, like blood and babies." " The worst evil is the slave that drags its counterparts into the same prison and thinks it is free," At times the writing came seem a bit heavy handed, like the author is holding our hands, and at other times, she let's us go to wander and figure things out. I loved this approach as it helped to move the mystery along while keeping the reader anxious about what would happen next.
"Someone has to uphold the status quo, even I as the victim, as it serves me too. If I don't, I end up as one of them. As long as nothing's done to me and my lineage, I'm okay with how the system runs."

I understood so much of what was happening to Nelah, the FMC, but at times I was also frustrated with her responses. She was logical when I thought she would get in her head and only think with her emotions, and then the times I expected her to be overcome by emotions, she would take charge and blow me away. I was so suspicious of many characters, but in the end I could not guess the magnitude of the plot twists in this story. I enjoyed this story immensely and would recommend to others!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an advanced reader copy to me in exchange for honest criticism.

*Spoilers below*

Womb City, written by Tlotli Tsamaase, is a dystopian horror story set in a future Botswana. We follow the main character, Nelah, as she navigates a world that wants to suppress her, a Loveless marriage with a husband who wants to use and silence her, and a lover who wants her to achieve her dreams. A successful architect, Nelah is unable to do the one thing that she thinks would make her whole - have a child. The first part of the book focuses on world building, explaining the microchip that invades Nelah’s life, and showing the society that thrives because its lesser members are controlled and exterminated before they can harm people. All is not as it seems, and before long Nelah is forced to confront the fact that the society that she has grown complacent in is not what she thought it was.

Tsamaase deserves a credit for her powerful, visceral writing style. We spend the story in Nelah’s head, and there is no reprieve from her descent into depravity and despair. There is something enchanting in the language that Tsamaase uses, and even when I was disgusted by what happened, there was a sharp and dangerous beauty in the prose. The world building is incredible - each page grows more and more oppressive, as layer after layer is peeled back and the disgusting heart of the city is exposed.

I’m not a fan of dystopian stories, so my interest in this book was piqued by the promise of the vengeful spirit. When the spirit showed up, in all of her rotting glory, it was worth the wait. I do feel that the spirit was under-utilized to an extent, redeemed before truly given a chance to shine.

It should also be said that this book can and will be very triggering for some people. There is violence against women, sexual violence, molestation, miscarriages, and more. That’s something to be aware of going into this - if these are upsetting to you, and trust me, they were quite upsetting and they were meant to be - it is okay to sit this one out. Parts of the story were emotionally grueling, like treading through water wearing the heaviest parka imaginable.

As beautiful as the prose is, there are some things in this book that kept it from being a 5-star read. At times the dialogue was over-expository and clunky. The characters would speak for paragraphs and paragraphs, explaining the subtler parts of the story. These were things that the reader would have picked up on, or things that felt unnatural coming from their mouths. Sometimes the message gets a bit heavy-handed, and at points the characters turn into mustache-twirling cartoon villains.

That being said, this is overall a very incredibly well-written book. Tsamaase is an incredible author. If you are interested in dystopian stories, afro-futuristic stories, or stories in the vain of The Handmaid’s Tale, this is perfect for you. The world-building is incredible and the prose is addicting. I cannot wait to see where Tsamaase’s career takes xem.

I had the pleasure of receiving an advanced copy from NetGalley so I could read this debut novel before it came out.

This novel was a living nightmare throughout. The horror was very effective and had me gripped from the get go.

I found the writing style difficult to follow as I’m not used to it. And I noticed that sometimes I wasn’t sure if the characters were explaining things through dialogue or if the main character was just explaining things to us. Also, I found a bit of repetition when explaining the world and the policies and how their world worked. I wished a few times that things would have been left a bit more vague until closer to the end to reveal the world more succinctly and organically.

However, the concept of this novel was so unique. It's clearly a commentary on the Black experience and possibly more, but I couldn't quite pinpoint the specifics, perhaps because I’m not BIPOC. The characters were a bit hard to connect with initially, but as the story progressed, I found myself rooting for them against the oppressive system they were trapped in.

The plot was a whirlwind of revelations and twists, keeping me engaged till the end. Despite the writing style that I had difficulty connecting with, I was invested enough in the story to continue reading and am left with a desire to reread and annotate this book once I get my physical copy.

I would recommend this novel to anyone who enjoys reading horror and sci-fi genres, and appreciates exploring deeper societal themes through fiction. I look forward to reading more from Tlotlo Tsamaase in the future.

Womb City is a weird book, and I like weird, but I felt like it was trying to do way too much. There were so many themes and overexplaining and trying to get the reader to adopt the characters' opinion rather than letting the reader understand and come to their own conclusion. I feel that if they stuck to 1-2 themes, it could have been more powerful and enjoyable. Not that the themes aren't important and timely to explore, but the book was trying way too hard and there was so much going on. The writing was also disruptive with so much exposition in the dialogue that it felt very unnatural at times. The overall plot was interesting and even though I almost DNFed 1/2 way through, I did stick with it and it got even crazier with each page. I don't think I'd recommend this book, but it did keep my attention enough to finish.

While this is a 2 star for me - I cannot say it will be a 2 star for others. This book has a very cool premise, with consciousness able to live longer than one's body by "body swapping." The sci fi is strong in this one, and I do not recommend for a light sci fi reader. Tsamaase clearly thought through this world a LOT, and that is what really made this book not-for-me. Tsamaase has thought through so much of the complexities of this world - the politics, the social dynamics, etc. - but the more I learned the more I could not suspend my disbelief. I was just asking more questions about the world and not about the story itself, and it really drew me away from the characters.

The writing is great, and the concept is THERE. I was really disappointed that this didn't work for me.

Thank you to Kengsington Books and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

It is a grim time to be a woman in Botswana. Nelah is a brilliant architect running firm that is struggling with finances. Her husband Elifasi is the assistant commissioner of police in Gabarone, but he lacks desired traits to gain further upward mobility. Neither of their positions is truly secure. Nelah’s body once belonged to a young criminal, and so her husband monitors her every action through a microchip embedded in the back of her neck, lest her body return to the illegal behaviors of its former occupant. If she violates a law, a drone will swoop in and capture her so that her consciousness can be imprisoned and her body can be given to the next person in the queue for a body hop. In the distant future of Tlotlo Tsamaase’s Womb City, the patriarchy has expanded its clutches to predicting crimes, with women being disproportionately convicted of potential crimes. Nelah struggles constantly under the oppressive eye of her husband and questions what happened to the original occupant of her body that caused the loss of one of her arms before Nelah’s consciousness was placed in it.

Nelah and Eli have a deeply troubled marriage. Not only must they contend with the potential of Nelah’s current body to revert to the criminal ways of its former host, but they also struggle with infertility (Nelah claims that she is referred to as The Black Womb in the aftermath of four miscarriages). Eli wants to be a father so that he can gain clout at work, and so he and Nelah eventually put more money than they can afford into an artificial incubator. While the allows them to successfully conceive, they now have the financial obligation hanging over their heads as well. Every morning, Eli reviews recordings from Nelah’s microchip, and her every move is closely monitored, recorded through her own eyes. Eli fears that the slightest indiscretion on Nelah’s part will cause him to lose his job, or at least fail to secure a promotion. With all of these threats to her own wellbeing, Nelah begins to look for any possible out. She soon rekindles an affair with Janish Koshal, a powerful businessman who provides her with a way to prevent the microchip from recording their time together.

When a drug- and alcohol-fueled drive results in the death of a young social media star at Nelah and Jan’s hands, however, everything changes. Nelah must find a way to navigate the perils of a crushing patriarchy, save her and Eli’s child, and confront a power that she may never truly comprehend.

Womb City is a brilliant, but difficult read. It’s heavy cyberpunk with strong elements of racial and gender equality. The language is immersive, blending Setswana words and phrases throughout the narrative and painting a picture of a future that should be so much better than it is. Tlotlo Tsamaase (xe/xer and she/her pronouns) has put forth a strong adult fiction debut for those who are willing to put in the time and effort. Be warned that it isn’t for the faint of heart, and pay heed to the content warnings xe placed at the beginning of the book, because there will be no punches pulled. I’m grateful to NetGalley and Erewhon Books for an eARC in exchange for a fair review. Womb City was released today, 1/23/24. Go check it out.

This review originally appeared here: https://swordsoftheancients.com/2024/01/23/womb-city-a-review/

So, before we get to it, this is a dark book, which you can likely tell by the content warnings above from the start of the book. So please take care of yourselves if any of this is too much for you! The commentary that comes out of all of those awful concepts though felt certainly worth the read for me. This is not awfulness for the sake of awfulness, it is to demonstrate the society that our main character Nelah finds herself in. Things are not pretty. Especially for a woman, and even more especially for a woman of color, the world is a very unkind place (see what I mean about the commentary? This is rather important stuff, friends.) Also, because Nelah finds herself in a body of someone deemed "criminal", and therefore has lost the right to any privacy, including her innermost thoughts, which are monitored by her (awful) husband.

What Worked For Me:

Obviously, saying I "enjoyed" this book would be a misnomer. I appreciate this book. I find a lot of value in this book. This book tells a great story. And that is the crux of what worked for me- seeing Nelah fight, and being mad as hell that Nelah has to fight so constantly. And look- Nelah has flaws of her own, don't misunderstand! In fact, I really quite like that the author didn't pain her in some kind of perfect light. No, Nelah makes plenty of mistakes, some choices that I didn't understand or agree with. But at the root of it is that she is treated inhumanely for simply existing as a woman in this world.

Add to it all, Nelah has to save her own life and the life of her unborn child from this entity that is seeking vengeance. But what will the cost be? Can she even begin to do that with her controlling, abusive husband running interference? Can she trust anyone? There are so many great questions and mysteries to be answered along with the commentary.

What I Struggled With:

The ghost part was a bit hard for me to wrap my head around, honestly. I did begin to understand a bit more as it went along, but I did have some trouble with it for a bit. Also a bit difficult for me was the ending, which obviously I won't speak of, except to say that I did have a bit of trouble following it at times. That said, it is still worth the story, and while I didn't totally grasp what was happening at every turn, I grasped enough to make the whole thing satisfying enough.

Bottom Line: A brutal but thought provoking book that covers a range of important topics, with quite a mystery to boot.

Thank you netgalley for the ARC!

Oh my gosh! This book was sooooo good. The way they treated women made me cringe but the way the FMC was still living her best way regardless was giving what it was supposed to give. Her husband was urking my nervous but the side dude.. ya know what I n we you to get this book... NEOEWWWW AND LET'S CHAT LATER!

-Anniee bee

Thank you to the publisher and netgalley for a free advanced copy in exchange for an honest review. 4.5 stars

Happy pub day!

I am not a huge sci fi reader and I think that's why this book worked so well for me. I can understand critique of the actual sci-fi elements and world-building, however what worked for me so well in this book is our characters and narrative. The story is intense from the get-go and the action does not stop until the very end. For being a debut novel, I felt that this was done extremely well, and I am looking forward to future publications by this author. I did give it some leniency on more technical aspects due to being a debut and keeping me engaged the entire time I was reading the book.

My minor critiques on this would be at times it felt like there were too many points that the author was trying to make. The book would have been a bit more polished with a few less plot points, with energy put into making those plot points more concise and fleshed out. The ending felt a bit jumbled and rushed for me as well, and I would have loved to see a bit more of an ending than just the final chapter. I am curious if that ending was set up for a sequel to this novel though.

Overall, I loved the story, the sociopolitical commentary and meshing of feminism with sci-fi, and the character dynamics. Well done and I am excited to see what the author puts out next.

I have heard so much about this book. It is on more than one of the "Books to Look For in 2024" type lists. When it came to it, I had to force myself through it. The world building was confusing and forced. The characters were boring to me. I really thought I would love this book. The execution, not the subject, was awkward.

This book was phenomenal! The premise is so interesting and realistic — it's terrifying how easily technology has the capacity to end in dystopia, but still maintain such familiar real-world prejudices, and Nelah is right at the heart of it. I felt Nelah's emotions so viscerally throughout this book, felt her frustration and brief moments of joy as though they were my own. There was a lot here — the genre shifts from sci-fi to thriller to horror and then back again, quickly. I definitely think it was inventive genre-blending at work here, and it adds a nice oomph, I think, overall to the story to have these mixed plot points!