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Star Child: A Biographical Constellation of Octavia Estelle Butler by Ibi Zoboi is a genre hybrid — a biography told in poems, quotes, and essays that describes the remarkable mind of the first Black woman sci-fi writer. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ Octavia Butler was a born writer, crafting stories in a little pink notebook and eventually on a Remington typewriter before she knew how to type. She adored science fiction and was frustrated by the limited roles of girls in storytelling — and so she wrote stories where Black women are heroes: where they travel back in time and far into the future. She understood that speculative fiction freed people from the restraints of the here and now and allowed writers to craft stories that explored our humanity. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ As a child, she saw a terrible sci-fi movie and thought, I can do better. So she did. And honestly that’s the energy all of us need to bring into what we do, am I right?! Fast forward many years and an adaptation of her novel Kindred is in the works. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ The format of this book is non-traditional, and even a little jarring, but then again, so was Butler. I especially appreciated Zoboi’s note at the end, where she wrote about her experience with Octavia Butler’s work, and then with the woman herself. That said, I did enjoy learning more about Butler as a person — it will definitely inform the way I teach one of her novels going forward! ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ ID: A kindle displaying the ebook cover of Star Child lays on top of a notebook and fountain pen in a leather cover on top of a blanket. via Instagram https://instagr.am/p/Cb7slp9rPKi/