I’m excited to feature Wole Talabi in my Mini Q&A! If you haven’t already read his novel, Shigidi and the Brass Head of Obalufon, go read it now! You won’t be sorry. Huge thanks to Wole for taking time to answer my questions!
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Myna: Tell us about your new collection!
Wole: CONVERGENCE PROBLEMS is my third book (second collection). It represents my current evolution as a writer. Featuring everything from a novella “Ganger,” which is both a retelling of a Yoruba legend as well as an exploration of where our current obsession with computer technology and geoengineering could lead us, to flash fiction like “Nigerian Dreams” which explores technology, migration and national identity, and covering topics like AI, space exploration, climate change, neuroscience and more, I think it will appeal to anyone who enjoys philosophical science fiction and fantasy stories told in unexpected ways from an African perspective. Reviews have called it a “modern classic” and a “triumph of short fiction”. High praise indeed, and I’m grateful.
Myna: What themes do you explore in this collection?
Wole: The stories in this collection mostly explore our relationships to technology especially on the possibilities and challenges around technological or supernatural variations on the world. They investigate the rapidly changing role of technology and belief in our lives as we search for meaning, for knowledge, for justice; constantly converging on our future selves.
Another theme that I explore in the book is the role of African thought in the modern and future world. I try to incorporate traditional African sciences, culture, philosophies, beliefs, and histories in my stories right beside any scientific and technological development I envision for CONVERGENCE PROBLEMS because I think it’s important to foreground African knowledge systems and acknowledge the vastness of what is not yet known in the universe and all the different ways in which people have filled those gaps.
Myna: What’s unique about this book?
Wole: I guess the variety of story formats, lengths and POVs in the collection. I enjoy experimenting with form. I love finding unexpected ways to tell a story effectively. And CONVERGENCE PROBLEMS is full of experiments – stories formatted as patent application documents and blog posts, non-linear narratives, stories-within-stories-within stories, etc.
Myna: When a reader finishes the last word in the book, what emotion will they be feeling?
Wole: A sense of wonder and joy and human possibility.
Myna: How did this collection come about?
Wole: I’ve always wanted to publish short story collections. In fact, I have a plan to publish at least five story collections and I have four of the five titles chosen already.
However, I wasn’t sure CONVERGENCE PROBLEMS was ready until I wrote the novella “Ganger.” That story touches on so many of the themes I had been exploring in my recent work that I knew it had to be the centerpiece. And so, I selected stories that were in conversation with it and with the title of the collection.
I was very grateful that when I sent it to the Publisher, they picked it up immediately with little to no change – the stories selected and their order, all of that, is as I envisioned it.
Myna: If your book had a theme song, what would it be?
Wole: Its hard to have a theme song for a collection, as each story evokes different moods but if I had to pick, I’d probably choose Exogenesis Symphony by Muse.
Myna: How do you balance character development, emotion, and technology in your works?
Wole: I try to write stories where the science and technology that is not just background but resonates with the character’s personal journeys and allows an examination of a familiar human emotion and experience. When I get that resonance and alignment, the balance emerges naturally because the ideas inform the theme, and the theme is illustrated in the character development or progression. To do that I look for and highlight unexpected parallels and similarities between science fictional ideas and historical/social aspects that can be mapped onto a character. That’s what I usually aim for anyway.
Myna: What’s your favorite thing about writing?
Wole: Every time I write, I learn something new. Sometimes I learn random facts. Sometimes I learn something about people. And very often, I learn something about myself. And I love that.
Myna: How do you stay motivated?
Wole: I try to always set new challenges for myself. Challenges are motivating because I am always excited at the opportunity to learn something new. I like to push myself. I feel that if I was writing the same kind of story over and over, even if I was doing it well, I would probably lose interest and motivation and stop writing.
Myna: Have you published other books or stories you’d like to mention?
Wole: Of course! My novel SHIGIDI AND THE BRASS HEAD OF OBALUFON which was a Washington Post top 10 best science fiction and fantasy book of 2023 and has been nominated for six major awards (The Nebula award, The Locus award, The BSFA award, The Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing Prize, and The Nommo award). I have to mention that too, right?
It’s a contemporary adult fantasy novel filled with the mythos of Nigeria and features Yoruba gods liberating an artefact from the depths of the British Museum. Its fun, and I hope readers check it out.
You can also check out my first collection INCOMPLETE SOLUTIONS.
Myna: Do you have a pet, or other non-writing hobbies/activities? Show us a picture!
Wole: Yes, I do. I absolutely love scuba diving. There is something amazing about being underwater. Its a whole new part of our world. Disorienting and beautiful and strange. I find it extremely relaxing.
Myna: What’s next for you?
Wole: I’m working on my second novel – a near-future science fiction thriller that is also a meditation on the nature of memory, legacy, and connectedness featuring assassins, aliens, AI, ancestral memory, and a lot more. I hope to be able to announce more soon.
I just finished writing a new science fiction novella set in the Sauútiverse – the first African SFF shared world. It’s a planetary exploration story called “Descent”. There are also many stories set in the Sauútiverse being written right now.
I also have a few short stories making their way out into the world soon including one “Encore”, set 3 million years in the future, that appears in Deep Dream: Science Fiction Exploring the Future of Art, and another called “Unquiet on the Eastern Front,” set in East Africa during World War II coming from Subterranean Press later this year, so I’m excited about those.
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WOLE TALABI is an engineer, writer, and editor from Nigeria. He is the author of the nebula and BSFA award nominated novel SHIGIDI AND THE BRASS HEAD OF OBALUFON (DAW books/Gollancz) one of the Washington Posts Top 10 Science fiction and fantasy books of 2023. His short fiction has appeared in places like Asimov’s Science Fiction, Lightspeed Magazine, Africa Risen and is collected in the books CONVERGENCE PROBLEMS (DAW books, 2024) and INCOMPLETE SOLUTIONS (Luna Press, 2019). He has been a finalist for the Hugo, Nebula, BSFA and Locus awards, as well as the Caine Prize for African Writing. He has won the Nommo award for African speculative fiction and the Sidewise award for Alternate History. He has edited five anthologies including the acclaimed AFRICANFUTURISM: AN ANTHOLOGY (Brittlepaper, 2020) and MOTHERSOUND: THE SAUÚTIVERSE ANTHOLOGY (Android Press, 2023). He likes scuba diving, elegant equations, and oddly shaped things. He currently lives and works in Australia. Find him at wtalabi.wordpress.com and at @wtalabi on Twitter, Instagram, Bluesky and Tiktok.
SHIGIDI and CONVERGENCE PROBLEMS cover Art by Jim Tierney.
INCOMPLETE SOLUTIONS cover by Joey Hi-Fi
Website link: https://wtalabi.wordpress.com/
Link to order CONVERGENCE PROBLEMS – https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/739890/convergence-problems-by-wole-talabi/9780756418830/
Link to order SHIGIDI – https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/688459/shigidi-and-the-brass-head-of-obalufon-by-wole-talabi/
Link to order INCOMPLETE SOLUTIONS – https://www.lunapresspublishing.com/product-page/incomplete-solutions
Myna Chang 