A review by karnakjr
Science Fiction by Sherryl Vint

informative medium-paced

3.25

Vint’s essays here are fine. If anything, they probably need some room to breathe. Divided into 20ish page chapters by theme, Vint sometimes has to breeze by important works in a sentence or two. The sentences are also overtly academic, academic in a way sometimes droll and sometimes dry. I think I might assign some of the chapters for extra credit in my high school sf class next semester, but it’s still not the text book I’ve been looking for.

Vint also gives some works the benefit of the doubt, and others not. She presumes that some stories perpetuate racist, sexist, colonialist, et al. histories, while presuming others are critical of these legacies. Maybe she has criteria for determine this, but if so, it is unclear. 

I wish her analysis included more works outside of prose and live action film. Video games get a few brief mentions. Comics, graphic novels, and manga largely ignored.  Music has one or two mentions. Animation for children and animation for adults are absent. Sf (of any kind) for children is basically never even mentioned.

Maybe she was just squeezed by the MIT Press Essential Knowledge Format? This is the first of the series I’ve read. I’m not interested in continuing, but I’d check out one of Vint’s more specific books.