For example, Jemisin’s Hundred Thousand Kingdoms (2010) is a story about empire and slavery that plays out in a supernatural realm of deities and monsters.

The most popular Afrofuturist authors write deftly at this margin, where they are just as future-obsessed as their peers, but with different takes on questions about who gets to play which roles in these futures. Most importantly, “The Comet” helped lay the foundation for a paradigm known as Afrofuturism. Though best-known for his searing analyses of history and sociology, DuBois’ foray into fantasy in 1920 is among his most reflective works, ruthlessly blunt in its stance on racism’s inevitability. So ends “The Comet,” a relatively obscure but profoundly consequential short story by W. Suddenly he is unimportant to her, and she never looks in his direction again. She’s indifferent as her companions hurl racial slurs at Jim. In an instant, Julia relapses into her pre-comet white life.

They tell her that only New York was destroyed, that the rest of the world remains intact. Soon after, they encounter a group of white men, Julia’s fiance among them. The circumstances force Julia to reconsider her pre-comet racism: “How foolish our human distinctions seem-now.” Jim and Julia quickly develop an intimate bond. They share their shock and grief, soon realizing they might be two of the only remaining people on Earth. A survivor named Jim Davis, a Black man, searches the rubble for others, eventually finding and rescuing a white woman named Julia. A comet strikes New York City, killing almost everyone in sight.

The hundred thousand kingdoms