Nalo Hopkinson's anthology was about personal magic, using it to alter fate, which she described as "tricky, powerful, and often dangerous." Nnedi Okorafor's offering repays careful reading. It's trickier than its simple appearance.
Asuquo, the protagonist, is an alluring young woman, but she has the undesirable "seven glistening locks of dada hair" which made her a child of Mami Wata, the water deity who would come to collect and thought to be barren. Worse, she can fly. Her husband ties her down to keep her from flying away. She will become a legend, but even that will be rewritten.
What's wonderful here is the challenge it presents. It seems a typical feminist tale, but there are things that it accepts, rejects, or doesn't question, that should leave everyone uncomfortable, no matter what the perspective, which is exactly what Asuquo represents within her village--something that cannot be tamed or forced into a box. Any particular reading will have to ignore some details in order to make a case for forwarding a particular agenda. It has all sorts of barbs that makes it "tricky, powerful, and often dangerous."
