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A review by seawarrior
Unexpected Stories by Octavia E. Butler
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
4.0
While these earlier stories by Butler are not as polished as her later works, they adeptly handle complicated themes of responsibility and mercy within unjust and unique societies. Since they were published for the first time posthumously we will likely never get to fully know and appreciate Butler's inspiration for them and what they meant to her, which I feel is a significant loss. Instead, friends of Butler's introduce these stories and explain how it was a miracle that they were unearthed at all. It's a privilege to get to read a writer's work that was previously rejected for publication, and see how they grew in skill over the years. I would still recommend this collection to those looking to read relevant and morally complex science fiction stories.
Graphic: War, Violence, and Confinement