Global Dystopias

Some of the best contributions, many of them by women, include nuanced examinations of gender-based oppression. In Charlie Jane Anders's astoundingly good Don't Press Charges and I Won't Sue, the narrator is forced by the government into a body she doesn't want and didn't ask for. Maria Dahvana Headley's Memoirs of an Imaginary Country explores the connection between the colonization of women's bodies and colonization of non-Western countries. Tananarive Due's The Reformatory reveals a single moment of horrific abuse in a young black boy's difficult life. Maureen McHugh's Cannibal Acts and Nalo Hopkinson's Waving at Trains are both excellent stories of viral apocalypses and their aftermath. Publishers Weekly