7 Intriguing Facts About Popular Sci-Fi Writer Octavia E. Butler

ca. 2001 --- Author Octavia E. Butler Laughing --- Image by © Matthew Jordan Smith/Corbis

‘Kindred’

One of her popular books was “Kindred,” published in 1979. The book focused on a young Black woman going back in time to save a white slave owner who happens to be her distance ancestor.

OEB

Recurring Themes 

Her books had many ideas about race, gender, genetics, gene manipulation, interbreeding, miscegenation, symbiosis, mutation, alien contact, nonconsensual sex, contamination and many more. She was observant about the world that she inhabited and she wanted her ideas to reflect the displeasure in that world and the possible good that could from the world. What makes her books interesting is that her characters are down and out and they always pick themselves up and prosper.