Looking Beyond Binary

Speculative fiction, that hard-to-define genre that encompasses everything from science fiction to alternate histories, is all about the fantastical, the what-ifs. It is all about imagination. It’s a genre that challenges the reality that we live in, dreaming of and exploring new ideas about society. Stories exploring gender-identity, therefore, are perfect for such a genre.

Beyond Binary is an anthology of seventeen stories, edited by Brit Mandelo, that have little in common aside from them all exploring how their characters define their gender identity. It’s 256 pages of enjoyable thought-provoking fiction and wonderfully designed to boot.

When I first read a review of Beyond Binary, I did so as someone who knows very little about challenging gender identity. I amstill that now, feeling that I’m somehow unqualified to tell you about genderqueer fiction when I am a cissexual woman and at ease being that way. I didn’t know that I wanted to read something like this. But perusing that review, I suddenly discovered in myself the desire to read this thing beyond my realm of experience.

I’d never read a book like this one. I enjoyed the sci-fi, the fantasy, the stories in between, and I loved the fact that it was queer. Yes, I am biased, and perhaps that might make my opinion less valid. But Beyond Binary is just refreshingly different. Even now every story makes me think about the world we live in, and those stories that I’m not as keen on still leave me with some interesting imagery or an absorbing concept.

This is a fascinating anthology, and important because it succeeds in breaking the heteronormative mould that permeates fiction. But it is in no way perfect, and that’s not just because it’s an anthology – meaning that the likelihood of one loving every single story is low. For a book that promises to go beyond the gender binary, there are very few genderqueer characters; not every story is as fantastical as I would have liked, although given the broad nature of the speculative genre I’ve come to the conclusion they all fit in somehow.

Take one of my favourites, ‘Another Coming’ by Sonya Taaffe. It’s a fabulous little bisexual story about the parentage of an unwanted child conceived in a poly relationship. But that doesn’t make it genderqueer. Richard Larson’s ‘The Ghost Party’ is a menacing piece about a ghostly rave, but aside from the party its main character Charlee is basically dealing with her attraction to another girl – again, not particularly challenging to the gender binary, in my opinion anyway.

Since this is an anthology there’s something for everyone. My favourites include Kelley Eskridge’s novelette ‘Eye of the Storm’, which is so good that I will simply recommend you read it, regardless of whether you do that by buying this book or one of the author’s other collections. Keyan Bowes explores the concept of parents being able to choose the gender of their child and what might happen if their child disagrees with that choice in the story ‘Spoiling Veena’. ‘Sex with Ghosts’ features an asexual narrator coming face-to-face with her doppelganger, who is a customised sexbot made by her sleazy boss for the pleasure of brothel clients.

Equally the nature of an anthology means you probably won’t be a fan of every single story you read. For instance, I struggle with the Caribbean dialectin Nalo Hopkinson’s ‘Fisherman’ and usually skip it, but most reviewers call it one of the best stories in the collection. I originally disliked ‘Pirate Solutions’ by Katherine Sparrow, which is about a group of computer hackers who drink special rum that turns them into pirates, or they re-inhabit their past lives as pirates because of the rum, or something. Somehow the tale has grown on me precisely because I don’t understand it, so I read it fairly often, unable to get the imagery out of my head.

On reflection, this collection doesn’t always live upto its title. But I think I could have done worse for an introduction to queer fiction. The stories are solid and enthralling. You might not know that you want to read this, just as I didn’t. But I hope that I’ve encouraged you to think about stepping beyond the boundaries of what you normally read by telling you that this anthology exists. Try it. You might find Beyond Binary to be one of the most interesting things you’ve ever read.