Slipping

September 12, 2016
In this hard-hitting collection, South African author Beukes (Broken Monsters) mixes present-day realism with science fiction, and flash fiction with personal essays. These are not nice stories. The characters bleed and sometimes die; those who don’t have learned how to fight back. Highlights include “Smileys,” a story set in present-day South Africa, in which an old woman bringing home sheep heads to cook for resale is hounded by a soldier who foolishly hopes to extort money from her; “The Green,” which concerns conscripts living in awful conditions on a deadly jungle planet, where they gather valuable flora and fauna for their uncaring corporate masters; “Pop Tarts,” set in a near future where the best friend of a hot reality star discovers that every moment of her friend’s life is scripted and filmed, even her kidnapping; and “The Unaccounted,” which concerns a prison commander on an alien planet who finds it harder and harder to differentiate between his alien prisoners and their human jailers. Whether they’re set in modern-day Johannesburg or on a planet circling a distant star, these powerful, beautifully written stories are always about today and the darkness of the human soul. Agent: Oli Munson, A.M. Heath Literary (U.K.).

September 15, 2016
An art installation so tactile as to feel alive, a ghost that lurks alongside a promising architecture student, a girl gutted from the inside to make a premiere athlete: all stitched together into a punk tapestry of stories and other short pieces.Cape Town author Beukes (Zoo City, 2016, etc.) makes good use of her South African homeland, though she often turns Johannesburg and Cape Town into futuristic wastelands, as in "The Green," a sci-fi militaristic nightmare of a short story, or "Riding with the Dream Patrol," an unsettling look at where our cyberfuture could be headed (hint: bad places). There are also more straightforwardly bizarre entries, bordering on pure science fiction but never losing Beukes' dark comedic edge, particularly "Unathi Battles the Black Hairballs," wherein a fighter pilot (a woman, of course) must save Tokyo. Also, there are talking cats to spice things up (where there are hairballs, there must be cats). Some of the most effective pieces are the shortest, such as "Dial Tone," where Beukes evokes the lonely desperation of her nameless narrator in less than four pages, as the character places crank calls and is often simply soothed by the dial tone. Or "Confirm/Ignore," in which the narrator berates readers, and society at large, for their obsession with pop culture: "One day I get Bette Davis and Bettie Page confused. This is not my fault. It's yours." Her brief autobiographical pieces--on her first forays into journalism and a letter to her young daughter on the meaning of beauty--wrap up the slim volume nicely. Utterly bizarre and equally addictive, these pieces demonstrate that Beukes has only tapped the surface of her prodigious and wide-ranging talent with her novels.

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November 15, 2016

South African writer Beukes (Zoo City; Broken Monsters) showcases her evolution as an author with these 26 pieces--mostly short stories with a few nonfiction entries at the end. Stories such as "Branded" recall Beukes's debut, Moxyland, with its combination of cyberpunk elements and South African patois. That distinct regional flavor gets sanded out of some of the later tales, which hop among genres deftly. One of the more bizarre, "Unathi Battles the Black Hairballs," features a cameo by magical realism author Haruki Murakami. Some selections are more likely to appeal to readers unfamiliar with Beukes. For example, "The Green" is a fantastically creepy sf story of grunt soldiers on a planet with invasive local flora. Another good starting point is the title story "Slipping," which tells of a runner who has undergone extensive physical modifications. VERDICT Even the early stories, many set in Beukes's native Johannesburg, have a rough energy and imagination that shows why she remains an author to watch.--MM

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

November 15, 2016
Beukes has garnered much attention for her creepy and compelling genre-bending fiction, and here she turns her menacing eye to 26 short pieces. The works here are varied in topic and even form: from flash fiction, to Tweets, to more traditional short stories, but all are tantalizing, dark, and thought-provoking. Particularly strong are the dystopian stories that hit uncomfortably close to home, such as Slipping, The Green, and Pop Tarts. In five nonfiction essays, Beukes opens up about the stories behind her work and offers up a beautiful love letter to her daughter. Interestingly, the volume prominently features her home of South Africa as an inspiration, setting, and even a character at times; there is also a much-needed glossary of South African terms included at the end. The collection stands as a testament to her technical skill and original voice, but it may leave readers impatient for her next novel. A great option for fans of her writing, this is also a good suggestion for readers of other atmospheric and complex tales, like those written by Gillian Flynn, Lauren Groff, and Karen Russell.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)