Join us for our February book club discussion of Nisi Shawl’s alternate history novel Everfair. The novel follows a group of British evangelists and American abolitionists who purchase part of the Belgian Congo in order to create a safe haven and aspiring utopia called Everfair.
From the publisher:
Fabian Socialists from Great Britain join forces with African-American missionaries to purchase land from the Belgian Congo’s “owner,” King Leopold II. This land, named Everfair, is set aside as a safe haven, an imaginary Utopia for native populations of the Congo as well as escaped slaves returning from America and other places where African natives were being mistreated.
Shawl’s speculative masterpiece manages to turn one of the worst human rights disasters on record into a marvelous and exciting exploration of the possibilities inherent in a turn of history. Everfair is told from a multiplicity of voices: Africans, Europeans, East Asians, and African Americans in complex relationships with one another, in a compelling range of voices that have historically been silenced. Everfair is not only a beautiful book but an educational and inspiring one that will give the reader new insight into an often ignored period of history.
Join the GiC Book Club in person at Main Point Books in Wayne, PA! We will meet on February 16 at 5 p.m. You can RSVP on Facebook at this link. Please visit or call Main Point Books to pick up or reserve your copy of Girls Made of Snow and Glass.
