A wrestling with the faults and possibilities of the portrayals of race in this powerful genre

Meghan Gilbert-Hickey is assistant professor of English at Guttman Community College, a part of the City University of New York (CUNY). Her recent and forthcoming publications focus on intersectionality in contemporary popular literature and culture. Her work has appeared in South Central Review and Red Feather: an International Journal of Children in Popular Culture, and she has also edited a special issue of South Central Review that unpacks the successes and the limitations of the #MeToo movement.

Meghan Gilbert-Hickey's profile page

Miranda A. Green-Barteet is associate professor in the Department of Women's Studies and Department of English and Writing at University of Western Ontario. She is coeditor of Female Rebellion in Young Adult Dystopian Fiction, Reconsidering Laura Ingalls Wilder: Little House and Beyond, and Race in Young Adult and Speculative Fiction. Her work has appeared in Canadian Review of American Studies, South Central Review, and the Encyclopedia of African American Women Writers.

Miranda A. Green-Barteet's profile page

Race in Young Adult Speculative Fiction is noteworthy for the sheer variety of the novels that are under scrutiny, as well as for its large geographical scope.

SFRA Review

Taken together, these essays provide a foundation for discussing race in YASF and demonstrate how YASF can change so that all young readers might see themselves represented in YASF.

CHOICE

A substantive and fruitful response to Ebony Elizabeth Thomas's call for more critical attention to the Dark Fantastic. Meghan Gilbert-Hickey and Miranda A. Green-Barteet offer a timely anthology that speaks to this moment in the evolutionary history of speculative fiction, and each essay peels back layers of institutionalized racism and discrimination that have been both endemic and unaddressed within this genre for far too long. This volume constitutes a call to action for writers of YA speculative fiction—a genre that is experiencing an “earthquake??and will surely seed critical “aftershocks??future scholarly conversations about a genre that is only beginning to realize its potential.

Michelle H. Martin, Beverly Cleary Professor for Children and Youth Services at the University of Washington