So, I own far too many books that I haven’t yet read. One of my goals this year is to greatly reduce that number, and I’ve somehow convinced myself that the best way to do so is to start with the shortest books first (there’s probably a flaw in my logic somewhere, but I’m going to ignore it for the time being). Coming in at 90 pages, the shortest unread book that I currently own is Binti, by Nnedi Okorafor. It won the Hugo and Nebula awards for best novella in 2016 and 2015, respectively, which I think is around the time I acquired my copy.
Binti tells the story of a young woman from the Himba people who is accepted into a prestigious off-world university to study mathematics. Leaving her family behind, she sets off on a journey to reach the university, but her plans are complicated when a group of aliens attacks her ship in transit.
This book was… okay. Somewhat ironically, the reason that I chose to read this book is also the reason why I didn’t love it — it was just too short. While the story was interesting, and there were some intriguing themes and thoughts presented, there just wasn’t enough time to fully realize the story and I thought it was very rushed. Characters transition from wanting to kill each other to declaring themselves best friends in very few pages, and the main conflict is wrapped up extremely easily. I enjoyed my time reading it, but it’s probably one of those books that I’m going to completely forget about within a few days.