Falling in Love with Hominids

I typically read short fiction for one of two reasons, either it’s an author whom I love, and I’ve devoured everything else of theirs so I dig into their short-form stuff, or it’s an author whom I’ve never read before and I want to sample their work without trying to pick out a full-length book to start with. The latter was the case with Nalo Hopkinson’s Falling in Love with Hominids. Hopkinson is an author who’s been on my radar for a while now, so when the opportunity came along to check out her yet-to-be-released short fiction collection I jumped at the chance.

The collection starts out with a story set in a post-apocalyptic world where humans turn into angry flesh eating plants when they reach adulthood. For my money, this was the perfect story to kick off the collection. It is an incredibly gripping tale and introduces two over-arching themes that seemed to be prevalent throughout; humans and plants.

Okay, so that first theme sounds pretty obvious, most stories are usually about people, but remember, the title of this collection is Falling in Love with Hominids and story after story Hopkinson really makes you love the humans who populate her stories… even when they are ghosts. I was quite impressed with Hopkinson’s ability to create such interesting and engaging characters in the short space allowed in a short story format. Another quality I loved was that Hopkinson populates all her stories with what is possibly the most diverse cast of characters I’ve come across in the fantasy genre.

Like most times when I read short fiction collections, there were a few stories in Falling in Love with Hominids that I enjoyed less than others, but overall this was a very good collection, and probably the most unique short fiction collection I’ve had the pleasure of reading. Even after having had a few days to reflect upon the stories, I still can’t pick a favorite, but a number of them stand out very strongly in my memory.

Falling in Love with Hominids was one of those rare books that grabbed my attention and refused to let me do things like take notes or jot down tidbits I wanted to write in my review. This is a book that reeled me in for all the right reasons and made it nearly impossible to take my eyes off the page. Every reader will surely find something to love, as this collection is often hilariously funny, deeply tragic, intensely engaging, and strongly steeped with fantastic elements. Any author who can connect chickens to dragons via a genetic family tree is obviously doing something special with their writing.

It is refreshing to read an author who appears to not give a damn about genre conventions, boundaries or norms. Instead, Hopkinson provides one vivid, gripping story after another and presents a collection that demands to be noticed as a work that ignores the typical standards we see in speculative fiction all while expanding the boundaries of the genre. Falling in Love with Hominids isn’t so much groundbreaking as it is genre-molding, and Hopkinson is showing anyone who’s looking how truly unique, interesting and engaging science fiction and fantasy can and should be.

A wonderful book that served as a great introduction to Nalo Hopkinson - I can't wait to read more of her books. To me, this is most easily compared to Karen Tidbeck's Jagannath, one of the best books I've read recently. This is such a unique collection of science-fiction/fantasy stories written with such a strong voice.

Falling in love with hominids – despite our many failings.

** Trigger warning for sexual assault. The individual story summaries contain general plot details and/or vague spoilers. If you’re rather approach the collection with unsullied eyes, skip these. **

“Millie liked sleeping with the air on her skin, even though it was dangerous out of doors. It felt more dangerous indoors, what with everyone growing up.”
(“The Easthound”)

“Who knows what a sea cucumber thinks of the conditions of its particular stretch of ocean floor?”
(“Message in a Bottle”)

Confession time: This is my very first time reading Nalo Hopkinson, despite the fact that I’ve collected several of her novels over the years. (So many books, so little time!) Given how much I enjoyed FALLING IN LOVE WITH HOMINIDS, I aim to rectify this ASAP.

FALLING IN LOVE WITH HOMINIDS is Hopkinson’s second collection of short fiction, published some fourteen years after SKIN FOLK. She’s also edited/contributed to four others: WHISPERS FROM THE COTTON TREE ROOT: CARIBBEAN FABULIST FICTION (2000); MOJO: CONJURE STORIES (2003); SO LONG BEEN DREAMING: POSTCOLONIAL SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY (2004); and TESSERACTS NINE: NEW CANADIAN SPECULATIVE FICTION (2005). Born in Jamaica and raised in a middle/creative class literary environment, Hopkinson moved to Toronto at the age of sixteen and currently lives in Riverside, California. Her work often draws on Caribbean history and language, and exhibits wonderful diversity: gender, race, sexuality, nationality, you name it.

These hallmarks are on full display in FALLING IN LOVE WITH HOMINIDS, which features eighteen new and previously published tales. An eclectic mix of fantasy, science fiction, magical realism, fairy tale retellings, and the outright absurd, the stories found here are both highly entertaining and marvelously profound. The protagonists grapple with a variety of issues, from the mundane to the otherworldly: navigating the perilous landscape of adolescence; the politics of black hair; sexual abuse and assault; racism, misogyny, and homophobia; grief and loss; what it means to be human (and whether this status can even be relegated to humans); and the possibilities of alien visitation and botanic sentience.

Ever since starting the Dive Into Diversity reading challenge this year, I’ve made it a point to take notes on diverse characters in my reads. After the first three stories in FALLING IN LOVE WITH HOMINIDS, I nearly gave up – diversity is the rule here, not the exception, as is so often the case. Only three stories don’t feature a character who is explicitly non-white, LGBTQ, disabled, etc.; and in these cases, the cast is rather small, and race isn’t mentioned at all.

The other fifteen stories showcase casts that are as diverse as the plots are imaginative; characters who are black, Native American (Rosebud Sioux, to be exact), Indian, Latino, Armenian (maybe), and biracial; multiple gay and lesbian protagonists, some in committed relationships, others not – one gay man even recently out of the closet, after a decades-long marriage that resulted in children; interracial relationships and blended families; fat women and seemingly disabled children. In a refreshing change of page, it’s white, heterosexual characters who are the rarity.

As is the case with most anthologies, I enjoyed some stories more than others. Even so, there isn’t a single dud here: every story is enjoyable enough, though it’s true that some will stick with me much longer than others.

** begin spoilers **

“The Easthound” – In Millie and Jolly’s world, adolescence is a time fraught with danger and despair – for it’s when kids mature that they begin to “sprout.” Like their parents (all dead now) at the outset of the pandemic, teenagers transform into monsters seemingly overnight: rapidly growing, ravenous cannibal creatures that are a strange mix of those two horror movie staples, zombies and werewolves. Though they burn out quickly – done in by their taxing metabolism – usually they survive just long enough to crack open the skulls (or chests, or abdominal cavities) of their friends and loved ones. For this reason, most warrens of children exile their more mature members. When Millie wakes one morning to find what passes for Jolly’s bed empty, she goes out in search of her twin. Wonderfully creepy, and an apt metaphor for the teenage years. 5/5 stars.

“Soul Case” – This historically-inspired fantasy (Hopkinson first devised this story while writing her upcoming novel BLACKHEART MAN, about a “maroon” community of escaped slaves set several hundred years in the future) features a magical battle between the Garfun village and their more well-armed invaders. The three “Knowledgables” are able to thwart the attack, but not without great cost to one of the witches – who, before the day is done, will sacrifice herself to save her community from karmic retribution. 5/5 stars (and BLACKHEART MAN cannot get here soon enough!).

“Message in a Bottle” – In an attempt to protect the significant treasures of the past, future humans send genetically modified human clones back in time to pose as children and act as “curators” of a sort. Due to their unusual features, these time travelers are mistaken for disabled, contemporary humans (Delayed Growth Syndrome, or DGS kids) and are often marginalized: not only do they look odd, they act a little off too. That’s because they’re really adults, outfitted with the memories and knowledge of their Originals. Greg’s niece Kamla is one such future anthropologist: and it’s a piece in his exhibit that she’s sworn to protect. With ruminations on philosophy, art, and the very nature of what it means to be human, this is a weighty read – but a fun one, too! The animal lover in me especially appreciated Kamla’s take on sea cucumbers and molluscs. 5/5 stars, and then some.

“The Smile on the Face” – Rooted (see what I did there?) in the story of Margaret of Antioch, teenager Gilla channels the spirit of the half-dead cherry tree in her front yard to fend off a sexual assault. There’s so, so much to love about this story.

The ancient tree began talking to Gilla when she hit puberty and started to “fill out”; her large breasts and butt frequently make her the target of unwanted male attention, while her ample belly and unruly hair prove additional sources of stress. (In one especially memorable exchange, Gilla begs her mom – a Professor of African and Middle Eastern Studies – for micro-braids: “You want hair that lies down and plays dead, and you want to pay a lot of money for it, and you want to do it every six weeks.”)

Naturally the class predator Roger begins his campaign against Gilla by spreading rumors and slut-shaming before graduating to sexual assault and attempted rape – during a game of Postman, no less. When Gilla publicly accuses him of rape, nearly everyone rushes to her defense – save for Gossip Girl Clarissa, to whom Gilla makes this promise: “if something bad ever happens to you and nobody will believe your side of the story, you can talk to me. Because I know what it’s like.” Young women supporting other young women? Love. 5/5 stars.

“Left Foot, Right” – In the tradition of fairy tale heroines who always seem to suffer some form of foot trouble, Jenna continues to limp around town in one battered pump weeks after the death of her sister, Zuleika – to whom the shoes originally belonged. (The girls were fighting over the footwear when their car swerved off the road and into a river. I can relate, in a way; decades after the fact, my right hand still bears a scar from when my younger sister Meesh cut me with my own cheap plastic ballet slipper.) Every week Jenna revisits the site of the accident, tossing a brand-new pair of pumps into the water as an offering. But only when Jenna confronts the second life lost that day can she and her sister finally move on. I love reimagined fairy tales, and this one’s no exception. 5/5 stars.

“Old Habits” – A spirit remains tethered to the place its body died – and in “Old Habits,” that place is the mall. Every day the ghosts are forced to relive their deaths. Not that they mind, or at least not as much as you’d think; for these morbid reruns are their only chance to experience the trappings of corporeal existence. This story’s great on its own – the narrator’s death scene is an exercise in tragicomedy – but it’s Black Anchor Ohsweygian’s demise that really struck a chord with me. (A homeless woman killed by an overzealous mall cop – how timely.) 5/5 stars.

“Emily Breakfast” – When one of their three fire-breathing chickens (“Chickens are descended from dragons, you idiot.”) goes missing, it’s up to Cranston and Sir Maracle’s flying cat, Rose of Sharon, to hunt down the kidnapper and bring Emily Breakfast home. I loved the unusual menagerie of animals, but the overall tone is a little too cutesy-fantastical for my taste. At least Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner are rescue chickens though? 3/5 stars.

“Herbal” – After an elephant rampages through her apartment, Jenny finds that she misses the big guy. Fun and weirdly absurd (floating pachyderms!), but a little on the short side. 3/5 stars.
“A Young Candy Daughter” – You think being a parent is hard? Try raising a young God (a black girl named La’Shawna ftw!), learning how to do good in the world. Think: that one episode of The X-Files where Mulder tries to craft the perfect wish. 5/5 stars.

“A Raggy Dog, a Shaggy Dog” – Tammy Griggs is a fat (“Lots of surface for my tattoos.”) botanist who discovers that one of her orchids has hijacked a rat, modifying its anatomy to transform it into the ultimate urban pollinator – so naturally, she decides to use this new species to find a date of her own. It’s a win-win! Well, except for the poor robo-rat. 4/5 stars, mostly because the rodents broke my heart. Rats and mice rock, okay.

“Shift” – Hopkinson describes this as “a paradigm shift on THE TEMPEST.” I haven’t read the source material, but no matter: I enjoyed “Shift” just the same. Caliban fled from his mother Sycorax, who’s confined to the sea. Immediately upon washing ashore, he meets his new girlfriend, an unnamed white woman who wears her golden hear in plaits and (he thinks) has a thing for black men (much like Miranda). But his sister Ariel is in hot pursuit, determined to deliver Mother’s favorite child back to her. Caliban, who transforms into the man (or boy, in mom’s case) the women in his life picture him to be. When confronted by Sycorax and Ariel, the new woman unexpectedly challenges Caliban: “Who do you think you are?” 5/5 stars.

“Delicious Monster” – After a life spent living in the closet, Carlos has finally found happiness. The bad news? It’s with a God who must soon depart, in order to fulfill an ancient promise between two families. A rumination on parents and children, and the passing of torches. 4/5 stars.

“Snow Day” – Ships from another world appear in the midst of a Toronto winter and ask the Earth’s animals – human and non – to make a choice: are you an Adventurer or a Beautiful Loser? Hopkinson’s submission to the Canada Reads Project, this short story incorporates the titles of that year’s five shortlisted novels: BEAUTIFUL LOSERS by Leonard Cohen; NO CRYSTAL STAIR by Mairuth Sarsfield; ROCKBOUND by Frank Parker Day; VOLKSWAGON BLUES by Jacques Pulin; and – my favorite – Margaret Atwood’s ORYX AND CRAKE. “Oh, hell yeah. I used ‘oryx and crake’ in a sentence.” I cheered. 4/5 stars, mostly because I wanted more.

“Flying Lessons” – Learning to leave your body during sexual abuse…I think? It’s a short and obscure one. 4/5 stars.

“Whose Upward Flight I Love” – In which the park service wrestles with trees fighting to break free of the ground to which they’ve been tethered and return to their homeland. I think this is a metaphor for romantic relationships, but damned if I know. 3/5 stars.

“Blushing” – This retelling of the Bluebeard folktale sees the nobleman marrying a woman who, much to his surprise and delight, is as depraved as he. The twist really caught me by surprise. 4/5 stars.

“Ours Is the Prettiest” – This short story is Hopkinson’s contribution to the shared-world anthology Bordertown, recently revived by Ellen Kushner and Holly Black (submission solicited by same). This is the first I’ve heard of it, so I was a little in the dark. Though the characters and their backstories eluded me, I still found the tale enjoyable enough and (mostly) easy to follow. It takes place on Jou’vert, the annual parade that kicks off the week-long Jamboree. Damiana is trying to keep Beti away from Gladstone, her paramour of several weeks who’s prone to fits of jealousy and violence, and is currently in a fit because she spotted Beti talking to another woman. But it’s not Gladstone Beti’s worried about – not when she’s being pursued by her brother from the Other Side. 4/5 stars.

“Men Sell Not Such in Any Town” – In which the rich want nothing more than to want more, and are willing to pay handsomely for the privilege. Masochism, delivered by robots. 3/5 stars.

** end spoilers **

I struggled for the better part of a week with the overall rating for this anthology. Normally, I try to average out each individual story rating; given the number of threes here, I’d normally give FALLING IN LOVE WITH HOMINIDS four stars overall. But the best stories are so damn shiny that I just couldn’t bring myself to do it! “Message in a Bottle,” “The Smile on the Face,” and “A Young Candy Daughter” are all so lovely and memorable and downright trenchant that they could carry the collection on their own. If they had to, which they don’t.

Final verdict: 4.5 stars, rounded up to 5 where necessary.

After just a few words into Falling in Love with Hominids, it's clear to see that author Nalo Hopkins is not your average old white male Fantasy writer. Nalo Hopkins is a woman of color with the talent of weaving a series of strong stories that entangle the reader and hold onto them for the duration. Hopkins' writing combines an incredible imagination with a fresh look full of Afro-Carribean, Canadian and American influences. Falling in Love with Hominids is a powerful collection of original short stories that tell a story about humanity, though often the stories seem far from it.

Hopkins excels at beginning a story seemingly in the middle of the action, before slowly unfurling the details of the world like flowers opening one petal at a time. Her stories contain a shape shifting disease that only affects certain age ranges, a woman who is becoming more one with her orchids than the humans around her, a teenager able to channel the power of a tree to fight off a would-be rapist and even a mall full of ghosts learning to interact with the human world again.

Once you start reading Falling in Love with Hominids it becomes increasingly difficult to put the book down again. Though conveniently written in the beautiful small chunk format of short stories, Nalo Hopkins leaves the reader desperately wanting to get a taste of the next story and the next set of imaginative characters.

Falling in Love with Hominids is beautiful, plain and simple. If you want something that breaks through the stereotypes of Fantasy writing and want a fresh and often bizarre take on the world around us, this is the book to put on the top of your reading list.

Falling in Love with Hominids is available August 11, 2015 from Tachyon Publishing. Look for it on on Amazon or on Powell's

This collection is a greenhouse, or a reptile house in a zoo; damp and warm and extremely, creepily organic, with so many growing, living things to gawk at. Amazing ideas, beautiful writing.

Nalo Hopkinson is a stellar writer, so I jumped at the chance to read this collection of her short stories prior to publication through NetGalley. The first entry, “The Easthound” starts things off with a bang. A tale of teens and pre-teens surviving post-apocalypse sets the tone: dark, but also hopeful. This is a collection on falling in love with hominids, after all. Several involve siblings in a way I find brilliant and fascinating such as “The Easthound”, and a later story, “Left Foot, Right”. Hopkinson sees to the heart of sibling relationships in a beautiful and frightening way with which any twin or sibling can identify. I’d love to talk up every entry, but I’ll just hit my absolute favorites (quite a difficult task to pick out). “A Smile on the Face,” a tale of a brilliant teenage girl desperately trying to fit in at a party - and getting she wants in a way that will make every awkward teenager and formerly awkward teenager (99.99% of hominids) smile also.

Zombies wandering through malls has been done repeatedly, and “Old Habits” is a fresh and absorbing take on those who died in malls haunting them. In “Flying Lessons,” these are not taught in school, but Carol will manage to learn anyway. Lastly, I’ll mention “Ours is the Prettiest,” which makes me want to scrounge used bookstores immediately for old Bordertown books I haven’t read in years. Yes, Hopkinson has brought in Screaming Lord Neville, and populated Bordertown with a range of people that reflect human society. Her introduction details how at least a few people were unhappy that she let non-whites into Bordertown and makes me fall out of love with hominids. What century are we in? But as long as there are writers like Nalo Hopkinson who create stories that look like me, my friends, my family I’ll be able to love many hominids for a long while to come.

If you’ve never read Ms. Hopkinson, Falling in Love with Hominids will give you a great introduction. If you’ve read all these when they appeared in various publications, take this chance to read them all again.

Wow! I'd never read any of Hopkinson's work before but I'm going to be checking out her back catalogue because this book blew my mind. She has such an imagination.

Where do I start and how do I manage not to spoil any of these stories? I can't even choose a favourite, they're all just that good. Very creative magical sci-fi and fantasy stories. Highly recommended.

Nalo Hopkinson’s stories are hybrids, blending science fiction and fantasy, Western and Afro-Caribbean influences, pain and joy, the real and the unreal. She has a particular talent for blending the magical and the mundane in surprising ways.

This book has fantastic female characters, great Caribbean influences, fun myths and magical fantasy. Basically, this short story collection was fantastic. It had the right amount of both heartfelt and heartbreak to keep me intrigued, widely varied story subjects to keep me coming back for more, and fantastically real characters to add depth to each story.
I'm not usually a fan of short story anthologies, but because I love magical fantasy so much, I thought I'd give this one a shot. I am so happy I did--it was fantastic.

As frequent readers will now, I love myself a good short story collection. Short stories are an art form of their own and annoyingly difficult to get right, so when a collection comes along which strikes my fancy I tend to try and get my hands on it as quickly as possible. With Falling in Love with Hominids I was immediately intrigued by Hopkinson’s tone and topics and I’m certainly glad I got a change to read her stories. Thanks to Netgalley and Tachyon Publications for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Falling in Love with Hominids is truly a magical collection of short stories which brings the reader completely different and new worlds to explore. What I found delightful about Falling in Love with Hominids as a whole was the way in which Hopkinson works with Fantasy and Science Fiction. She discusses it in her Introduction as well, that Science Fiction and Fantasy are exactly the types of genres which can be used to explore the everyday through the extraordinary or out of the ordinary. Quite often Sci-Fi authors are surprisingly lazy in how adventurous they try to be, not just with their stories but with their writing styles as well. Personally I a, a fan of authors who take a risk, who demand something of their reader as well. Whether it is having different narrators, switching between Creole and Standard English or unreliable narrators, each story in Falling in Love with Hominids is always refreshing. At the heart of Hopkinson's collection lie the hominids of her title, the Great Apes, the humans. Each story has a character at the core which Hopkinson explores with delicacy, which means that no matter how fantastical the story gets, it remains true.

Part of what makes Falling in Love with Hominids such an interesting collection is Hopkinson’s wide variety of protagonists. They’re male, female, young, old, orphaned, disabled, hetero-sexual, gay, etc. and each is written as well as the other. Switching between different voices and characters can be quite a challenge for authors but Hopkinson seems to nail all her characters perfectly, allowing the reader to empathise and identify with each one. Personally I found some of her stories focusing on young girls and women fascinating because her approach to fantasy and sci-fi allows Hopkinson a lot of room to describe humanity and its fault and virtues. On the other hand, some of her stories are also delightfully absurd, such as ‘Emily Breakfast’, which are a joy to read. Hopkinson's writing style doesn't really change between stories and yet each story feels different. They are infused with independent spirit and energy, while still being recognizable as Hopkinson's stories.

As a white, European woman I also really enjoyed the way in which Hopkinson brought in so much of her own background. Originally from Jamaica, Hopkinson doesn't shy back from having her characters speak Creole or to explicitly introduce black characters into stories where readers might not expect them due to strange genre expectations. It was incredibly refreshing and made every story interesting. Most of the fiction market is saturated with white, young, skinny female heroines falling in love with white, young, masculine male heroes in the same way, over and over again. Falling in Love with Hominids has characters from all over the world and all stories are prefaced by a short paragraph detailing Hopkinson’s inspiration behind it, whether it was a chat on an online forum or the history of escaped slaves in Africa. In one of the stories where it worked best was Hopkinson's adaptation of Shakespeare's The Tempest which is perhaps my favourite ever take on a Shakespeare-story. Highlighting the post-colonial undertones in the

I absolutely loved Falling in Love with Hominids. Almost every single story was a hit with me and I have become a definite fan of Hopkinson's writing. Each story was original and held something that fascinated me. I'd recommend this to fans of Sci-Fi, Fantasy and Women's Fiction.

A delightful author that weaves the fantastic with reality so well that the reader is forced to take perspectives on that they never expected. Genius.