The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin
What happens if, while walking up the escalator at in a Manhattan train station, you’re suddenly overcome with the sound of every taxi cab driver’s outraged honks? Of the smell of every street vendor’s cart? Of the rush of the water and the steam below the streets? Of the rhythm and pulse of traffic narrowly avoiding gridlock? N.K. Jemisin answers these questions in The City We Became and its sequel, The World We Make, and she absolutely knocks it out of the park. The mechanics of the world she has invented are fascinating and delightfully nerdy. The conflicts appeal to the little piece of me that wishes the world’s problems were all part of some grand conspiracy that could be dismantled, if only anyone knew about it. I only wish that this series could have been the trilogy that Jemisin had originally intended for it to be.
I recommend this book if you like sci-fi stories that build plausible metaphysics from our own reality, and then explore where those new rules take you. Or, if you’d like some feel-good sci-fi about queer folks punching Nazis!
From here on out, there are spoilers. Read on only if you’re okay with learning about plot details and the ending ahead of time.
Metaphysics
I really quite like the metaphysics of the multiverse that Jemisin has built here. She takes the old trope about every decision spawning a new universe and extends it by supposing that certain repeating structures inside this tree of universes have power. It reminds me of an idea I happened across once (but have forgotten the source) how cities are machines that create time. That idea has been knocking around in my head for a while, and it’s exciting to see it adapted and brought into this imagined multiverse.
It is also fascinating (although not explored in the books) to consider how constructs and concepts can be used as weapons against R’lyeh. They seem to derive their power from being repeated across all of the other instances of the city in the multiverse tree—perhaps the repetition allows a city-avatar to “slip” between universes? In any case, I thoroughly enjoyed wondering about that as I read.
Also, I love how Padmini (a mathematics savant, and also the avatar for the borough of Queens) is able to wield the city-magic by tweaking the constants in physics equations that govern something she’s trying to do, like run outside before someone is grabbed by a menacing tentacle. I suspect this appeals to me so much because it’s exactly how I would want superpowers to work if I actually had them. Need to jump really high? Tweak gravity, or adjust the spring constant in my shoes—but not so much that it breaks other things, like the orbit of the planet!
Nazi-Punching
I’m a huge fan of punching Nazis. I’m not sure I’d have the courage to do it in real life, but I’d absolutely cheer from the sidelines (and throw water on their tiki torches). It’s quite nice, then, that this series features a healthy dose of Nazi-punching. Especially Nazi-punching done by black, native, and queer folks.
As the situation in the US continues to deteriorate, especially for trans people, I found it relieving to escape into a story where the rising tide of fascism was merely an obstacle on the path to defending New York’s city-hood rather than a warning sign about the impending collapse of democracy. It was incredibly cathartic to read about Nazis getting kicked in the cojones by city-magic enhanced steel toed boots. Or about a Hummer full of road-raging Nazis magically vanishing inside of a ghostly chop shop. And it was especially nice to read about how the tide of fascism was easily beaten back as soon as the protagonists scored their victory over The Enemy.
If only things were that tidy in reality.
The Ending
While I’m on the subject of reality, I should discuss the rather disappointing ending to The World We Make. Don’t get me wrong—I still love this series. But given the time at which it was written and the author’s note at the end, I can absolutely understand why Jemisin felt the need to wrap it up prematurely. To briefly summarize the ending, the protagonists are gearing up for a massive showdown with R’lyeh and The Enemy, with other cities showing up in mech form to aid. And then the protagonists and The Enemy are pulled into a conference room, where Padmini has an epiphany and tells The Enemy “Hey, you missed a solution. If you stop watching city births, you won’t collapse the quantum wave function, and nobody needs to die.” And then The Enemy basically responds, “oops, sorry” and the book ends. While I’m happy that the conflict was resolved peacefully, it’s not the kind of ending I was hoping for. It felt abrupt. There was so much world-building that ended up having very little pay-off.
But I don’t blame Jemisin at all. The first book in this series was written before the COVID-19 pandemic swept the globe, and before/during the Trump presidency. It’s hard to write a novel about saving a city from fascism and decay when reality looks at each of your drafts and says “hold my beer.” And it’s especially hard to write a book about a city you love being afflicted by invisible menaces that ride on people’s shoulders or float through the air during a global respiratory virus pandemic. The avatar of Jersey City can’t show up to rip a vape cloud of city smog that blows away the virus in reality.
While I certainly wish this trilogy could have gotten the full treatment it deserved, I’m more than happy with what Jemisin has given us. I look forward to her next work hitting the shelves of my local library, and until then, I have the Dreamblood Duology to read!