The triumphs and woes of genius in Premee...
Conclusion From 12A
white, Canadian teenager, who gets richer by the year because of her patented inventions, lecture tours and commissions. Nick, however, is a working-class Guyanese immigrant who refuses to ask for any handouts and works hard for everything he owns. Also, because the novel is set in 2002, and Nick lives in a post-9/11 world, he’s also being targeted by xenophobes who think that every brown man is Muslim and therefore a terrorist.
These very real challenges help him to see the world and solutions to his problems very differently from Johnny. Johnny has her own struggles as well, like battling through the old boys’ club of STEM in order to be taken seriously as a scientist. But she is also rich enough to believe that tossing money at most of her problems will solve them.
I loved this juxtaposition because although Nick loves Johnny, he isn’t afraid to point out when she is naive or biased about the world. It makes the book more interesting, and shows that being a genius is great, but without someone to challenge your perspectives, your inventions can harm rather than help the ones around you.
I loved Beneath the Rising, especially since I got to watch a Guyanese kid run around the world, destroying monsters, and saving the planet. I’m excited to see what Mohamed does in the upcoming books. From the description, it seems like it will focus more on Nick’s journey, rather than him mostly narrating the life and times of Johnny Chambers, and I’m here for it.
I also loved the book because it’s just full of early 2000s references and inside jokes that make me a bit nostalgic for my own childhood. These, combined with the way she used the cosmic horror elements to show the effects of childhood trauma made the book an incredible read. If you like monsters, smart kids, and a lot of corny puns and early 2000s chaos, I’d highly recommend this book. It’s fun. It’s heart-breaking and it’s thrilling.
Want to read more cosmic horror? Here are my recommendations: Ring Shout by P. Djèlí Clark
The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin
The Ballad of Black Tom by Victor LaValle
What more books about Guyanese kids saving their world? Children of the Spider by Imam Baksh
The Dark of the Sea by Imam Baksh
Nikita Blair is a speculative fiction and creative non-fiction writer. Her work has been featured in Moray House’s Ku’wai magazine, The Guyana Annual, and the Commonwealth Writer’s blog. A collection of her work is featured on her blog, blairviews, where she writes book reviews, essays, and articles on topics of interest.