This year we published the concluding volume of Nnedi Okorafor’s Binti trilogy, bringing to a close a series that started with one of the first books Tor.com Publishing ever released. Binti, the story of a Himba girl who leaves her people to seek her place among the stars at the finest institution of higher learning in the galaxy, went on to win the Hugo and Nebula Awards for Best Novella, and readers couldn’t wait to continue following her adventures with Binti: Home and Binti: The Night Masquerade.
This July, we’re thrilled to bring you all three Binti books in hardcover for the first time, complete with new covers featuring original art by Greg Ruth. Take a look at these stunning volumes below, and get a sneak peek at the new foreword to Binti by the Broken Earth trilogy author N.K. Jemisin.
Illustrator Greg Ruth has created art for the covers of the German editions of many of Nnedi’s works, as well as her Akata series, and with these new covers he’s focused in on the powerful young woman at the heart of this space-spanning series. Binti navigates challenges that were once unimaginable to her back in her life on Earth, but even as she grows and changes she remains rooted in her own sense of self, and reaches into her own past for the tools to meet the obstacles she encounters. As N.K. Jemisin describes her in the foreword to the new hardcover edition of Binti:
“Every element of Binti’s physicality is a silent declaration of power—a perfect presentation for the math genius and heroine who will eventually end an interstellar war. Binti stamps at her luggage when it fails to move through the transporter quickly enough to start her journey. She screams and yells when she needs to be heard, or when she is afraid; no demure stoic endurance for her. She coughs and shudders through mourning her dead friends; it isn’t pretty, but then grief shouldn’t be. Others react to Binti’s powerful presence in purely physical fashion as well, as they perform their quick assessments and find her unworthy of inclusion: they lean away or cover their mouths, not even bothering to speak. They touch her and touch her and touch her, never asking first, and are offended when she protests this assault. But most often, Binti slaps back at their exclusion checks without using her hands. They want to sneer at her hair and skin but cannot do so directly. Both are safely covered by a layer of sweet-smelling ojitze, repelling their scornful glances with the power of tradition and homeland.”
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Binti
Her name is Binti, and she is the first of the Himba people ever to be offered a place at Oomza University, the finest institution of higher learning in the galaxy. But to accept the offer will mean giving up her place in her family to travel between the stars among strangers who do not share her ways or respect her customs.
Knowledge comes at a cost, one that Binti is willing to pay, but her journey will not be easy. The world she seeks to enter has long warred with the Meduse, an alien race that has become the stuff of nightmares. Oomza University has wronged the Meduse, and Binti’s stellar travel will bring her within their deadly reach.
If Binti hopes to survive the legacy of a war not of her making, she will need both the the gifts of her people and the wisdom enshrined within the University, itself — but first she has to make it there, alive.
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Binti: Home
It’s been a year since Binti and Okwu enrolled at Oomza University. A year since Binti was declared a hero for uniting two warring planets. A year since she found friendship in the unlikeliest of places.
And now she must return home to her people, with her friend Okwu by her side, to face her family and face her elders.
But Okwu will be the first of his race to set foot on Earth in over a hundred years, and the first ever to come in peace.
After generations of conflict can human and Meduse ever learn to truly live in harmony?
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Binti: The Night Masquerade
Binti has returned to her home planet, believing that the violence of the Meduse has been left behind. Unfortunately, although her people are peaceful on the whole, the same cannot be said for the Khoush, who fan the flames of their ancient rivalry with the Meduse.
Far from her village when the conflicts start, Binti hurries home, but anger and resentment has already claimed the lives of many close to her.
Once again it is up to Binti, and her intriguing new friend Mwinyi, to intervene–though the elders of her people do not entirely trust her motives–and try to prevent a war that could wipe out her people, once and for all.
Don’t miss this essential concluding volume in the Binti trilogy.
Join Binti on her journey on July 24th, 2018, when these gorgeous new editions are released in hardcover worldwide.
