Susan Forest and Lucas K. Law are joining us today to talk about their anthology Shades Within Us: Tales of Migrations and Fractured Borders. Here’s the publisher’s description:
Journey with twenty-one speculative fiction authors through the fractured borders of human migration to examine the dreams, struggles, and triumphs of those who choose–or are forced–to leave home and familiar places.
An American father shields his son from Irish discrimination. A Chinese foreign student wrestles to safeguard her family at the expense of her soul. A college graduate is displaced by technology. A Nigerian high school student chooses between revenge and redemption. A bureaucrat parses the mystery of Taiwanese time travellers. A defeated alien struggles to assimilate into human culture. A Czechoslovakian actress confronts the German WWII invasion. A child crosses an invisible border wall. And many more.
Stories that transcend borders, generations, and cultures. Each is a glimpse into our human need in face of change: to hold fast to home, to tradition, to family; and yet to reach out, to strive for a better life.
Featuring Original Stories by Vanessa Cardui, Elsie Chapman, Kate Heartfield, S.L. Huang, Tyler Keevil, Matthew Kressel, Rich Larson, Tonya Liburd, Karin Lowachee, Seanan McGuire, Brent Nichols, Julie NovÁkovÁ, Heather Osborne, Sarah Raughley, Alex Shvartsman, Amanda Sun, Jeremy Szal, Hayden Trenholm, Liz Westbrook-Trenholm, Christie Yant & Alvaro Zinos-Amaro.
What are their favorite bits?
SUSAN FOREST
“A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies. The man who never reads lives only one.” — George R.R. Martin (A Dance With Dragons)
Stories provide a glimpse into other lives. That’s why it was such a gift to have the opportunity to work with the stories in Shades Within Us: Tales of Migrations and Fractured Borders: to catch a glimmer of this range of experiences of moving across, through and within our fractured world. The voices brought me inside the characters, allowing me to walk in their footsteps for brief moments. Moments made significant by wings of poetry.
It is simple to say there are sacrifices demanded by migration, even a willingly chosen journey. But here in S.L. Huang’s Devouring Tongues is how a language student, desperate to escape a precarious political situation, faces the cost of her choices:
“Your parents quietly disapprove of the way the government forced you to learn Mandarin, but you’re secretly and shamefully grateful. Mandarin gives you half of Asia. And English gives you the world. Teochew gives you nothing. Redundant. Useless. But your eyes still prickle and blur, and you wish you could remember the names of your mother’s houseplants.”
A moment. A memory.
Sometimes the struggle to free one’s self from an intolerable situation involves running a gauntlet through Hell. The rhythms of the poetry become guttural for Superfreak from Tonya Liburd:
“‘Yo. Yo.’ Danielle’s hands clamped together, sweaty. Someone seemed to have smelt the new on her and come picking for a fight. ‘Yo, fucking bitch.’ A kick thumped the back of the sofa for emphasis. ‘Yo.'”
How about capturing the cockiness, the wisdom and limited perspective of youth by Kate Heartfield in Gilbert Tong’s Life List:
“Dad was still clinging, then, to the idea that one day, Canada would let us live there. That’s why he was always trying to get me to speak Kiribati. He was afraid, once I became a Canadian, I’d lose my culture. I thought anyone who was not a fool would know we had a lot bigger things to be afraid of.”
The loss of family observed by Heather Osborne’s From the Shoals of Broken Cities:
“His mother vanished overnight, a slim presence carefully sweeping up after herself.”
And the sweetness of new discovery and new culture in Habitat from Christie Yant:
“Marcel found the stall where he’d once bought her a flower garland. She laughed as he set one on her head, and they ate festival food and drank festival wine, which made them giddy. As they grew braver, they told each other stories. Later that evening beside a fountain, under strings of twinkling lights, with the scent of spring blossoms and sound of stringed instruments on the air, he kissed her.”
These, and so many more. Sweet. Powerful. Captivating. Words that capture a feeling, a moment. You are there. Underlying observations of who we are and the borders we are impelled to cross; and the lyrical voices that tell these stories: these are my favorite bits.
LUCAS K. LAW
How many of us stay in one place from birth to death? I think it is obvious that most of us, if not all, have moved or relocated at least once—whether by choice or through force. This move could be across town, continent, or ocean. It is not just a physical migration but also a migration of soul, mind, and spirit. Our journey does not begin or end when we find a new place; it is the series of experiences, challenges, and reflections—personal or shared—along the way, that make us who we are or what we become.
I see fragments of myself in each of the stories in Shades Within Us, from an immigrant to a person caught between two worlds, from dealing with a particular norm to accepting the uniqueness in each other, from facing discrimination to finding acceptance. Each story reflects the importance of history and storytelling; the importance of communicating and connecting through one’s own art, whatever that may be. And that is my favorite bit. Why?
Stories allow us to probe or reflect on our own history more deeply.
A few weeks ago, I asked my father, “Why do you keep mentioning the name of that remote fishing village?” He answered, “I lived there until my late teens.”
Boy, it was a revelation. I didn’t know that his family fled the city during WWII. I always assumed that he grew up in the city because he was born there and that was where most of his relatives were during the Japanese occupation. And, country life wasn’t in his blood.
I knew my mother grew up in the remote areas of Malaysia; for that reason, I assumed my father was talking about her fishing village all these years. This bit of information changed my perception of my father’s life. But it also gave me an entry to probe further into his childhood years. Suddenly, all the dots connected and made sense—the things he did and the reasons behind them.
In her WWII story, Screen in Silver, Love in Colour, Mirror in Black-and-White, Julie Nováková pins down the importance of connecting with our own histories:
“Other souls can become a part of our own. They do it every day quite naturally, just by reminding us of what has been and what should be. Tracking down our histories doesn’t steal our soul; it enriches it.”
Tracking down our histories—personal or cultural—understanding and living them, expressing and sharing them: this is art; this is story.
We are all artists. We all have histories and stories; and we all have the ability within us to create and express them: writing, cooking, painting, photographing, gardening. But if we worry that we are not good enough, we don’t have the right tools, or no one is interested, we can end up in a state of paralysis, and the art within us withers. So, when the time is right, be not afraid to share your story in whatever medium you are comfortable with. Seanan McGuire captures this in Remember the Green:
“Then I reach down, deep down, into the part of me that’s always in the green, where the green grows. The world can go as grey as it likes. I’ll still know the green.”
Remember your histories, your migrations; connect with, and share them. As Eric Choi and Gillian Clinton write in their Introduction to Shades Within Us:
“It is more important than ever to try and imagine futures that are optimistic and beautiful.”
LINKS:
Shades Within Us
Susan Forest
Lucas K. Law
BIOS:
Susan Forest is an award-winning author and editor of science fiction, fantasy, and horror. She has published over 25 short stories in Canadian and international publications. Bursts of Fire, the first in her seven-book epic fantasy adventure saga Addicted to Heaven, is not only her long-nurtured tale of rollicking adventure, but also an opportunity—one she appreciates—for an examination of the complex world of addictions. There is no family today that has not been touched by the heartache, stigma, struggles—and the often-unrecognized courage and hope—that underpin the illness of addiction. This motif is one Susan is humbled to explore with the aspiration of provoking dialogue, and the recognition of—and respect for—those whose battles are ongoing.
Lucas K. Law is a Malaysian-born freelance editor and published author who divides his time and heart between Calgary and Qualicum Beach. With Susan Forest, he co-edits Aurora (Canadian SF&F) Award-winning Strangers Among Us, The Sum of Us, and Shades Within Us. Lucas is the co-editor of Where the Stars Rise with Derwin Mak.
