Understanding Octavia E. Butler Author Talk with Kendra R. Parker (Online)

May 14, 2025 @ 8pm ET (6pm PT) | Location: Online

May 14, 2025 @ 8pm ET (6pm PT)
Location: Online
Hosted by: Sistah Scifi

Join us for an author talk with Kendra R. Parker. In her new book, Understanding Octavia E. Butler, Kendra shares new insights into the work of the acclaimed science fiction author.

Octavia E. Butler (1947-2006), a pioneer of science fiction and foremother of Afrofuturism, is among the most influential science fiction writers of all time. Butler's work blurs the boundaries of commercial genres, exploring themes of race, gender and sexuality, religion, politics, and environment. A recipient of the MacArthur "Genius Grant" and PEN America Lifetime Achievement Award, Butler is best known for her novels Kindred (1979), Parable of the Sower (1993), and Fledgling (2005).

In Understanding Octavia E. Butler, Kendra R. Parker surveys Butler's life, career, and major works, highlighting her ongoing interest in Black peoples' pasts, presents, and futures. After a biographical introduction, Parker evaluates Butler's career chronologically and thematically, with chapters covering her engagement with the African American literary tradition, her romance novels, and her nonfiction.

Kendra R. Parker is associate professor of African American Literature at Georgia Southern University. She is the author of She Bites Back: Black Female Vampires in African American Women's Novels, 1977–2011, and coeditor of The Bloomsbury Handbook to Octavia E. Butler. Parker is president of the Octavia E. Butler Literary Society and has appeared on NPR's hit podcast It's Been a Minute.

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Hosted by Sistah Scifi Wine Down Wednesdays.