How did “His Thing” originate? What inspirations did you draw on?

This is the first story I wrote at Clarion West in 2022 during the week that P. Djèlí Clark was the instructor so I set out to write an AfroSurrealist story because I knew horror-mastermind P. Dèlí Clark would be reading it!

AfroSurrealism for me blends absurdity, horror, fabulism, and the uncanny to tell Black stories. My stories usually explore the absurdities of patriarchy and its impact on African women. What I ended up with is a story I like to call domestic surrealism or maybe even a Zimbabwean gothic about a newly wed Zimbabwean girl trapped in a sentient house. Women are taught to aspire to marriage, to aspire for a marital home but the marital home can be a house of horrors, so in thinking of the house as a site of horror and violence I started worldbuilding around it. The house’s magic is controlled by the husband, the house makes her life difficult, new rooms appear and disappear, dirt and grime feed on her sweat and labor to keep her unendingly cleaning, etc. The house is not her friend and wasn’t made with her needs in mind. (But she does have a sentient rock that was gifted to her by her friend that’s her ally!)

The story also draws on Zimbabwean fabulism called Ngano. There is a popular Ngano called Simbimbino about a farmer who digs a hole in his field to trap his wife, when she falls in she transforms into a pig and her husband intends on cannibalizing her. I wondered what if the woman had some magic of her own at the end to fight back? What if it’s the husband who gets eaten at the end? What if she saved herself and wasn’t rescued by her son? What if her son, Simbimbino, who is the hero of the original Ngano is complicit in her oppression as well and feeds off of her? So in a lot of ways, the story might be a retelling or reenvisioning of that Ngano.

What is your writing process like? Did this story fit the pattern?

I like to write in community, I don’t think writing should be a solitary pursuit and it can be a communal affair! So I meet up with friends or get on zoom with friends that live too far away and we do writing sprints. The Kenyan author Shingai Njeri Kagunda is my main writing wifey and our writing sessions are always fun and chaotic. After the writing session, we sometimes read our favorite line or talk through whatever writer’s block or trouble we’re having with that particular scene or story. That kind of communal “troubleshooting” usually does the trick in getting me through the tough parts of getting a story together. Writing in community has also been really helpful in keeping me grounded and motivated. For this story in particular, I wrote it at Clarion West in Seattle surrounded by my cohort who are talented writers I could bounce ideas off of. Some of the changes I eventually made to the story came from the wonderful feedback and ideas I received from both my instructor and cohort.

In terms of how a story comes together on the page, I’m inspired by the real world. Whether it’s something I read in a newspaper, or a fable, or an urban legend people whisper to each other, or a conversation with a loved one. I’m always drawing from the real world because the real world is full of the uncanny and absurd. I think the biggest instances of magic, mayhem, and myth come from the real world and AfroSurrealists tap into that weirdness.

What trends in speculative fiction would you like to see gain popularity in the next few years?

I’m excited by all the books by African writers that have come out in recent years, we need more of that. I would love to see more work drawing on African story forms and indigenous knowledge systems, especially from southern African countries that are still underrepresented in genre spaces such as Zimbabwe, Malawi, Zambia, Botswana, etc.

What are you working on lately? Where else can fans look for your work?

My debut short story collection Drinking from Graveyard Wells came out in March this year. It’s a genre-bending collection that blurs the lines between social horror, Afrosurrealism, and fantasy to tell the story of vengeful spirits, southern African mythological creatures, and Black women taking on the patriarchy and capitalism. I’m currently working on an epic fantasy novel inspired by the stone city ruins of The Great Zimbabwe about three magical Black girls taking on the gods and the patriarchy.