By
Special to The Seattle Times (as told to Jonathan Zwickel)

BEING INVITED TO WRITE for “Octavia’s Brood” [an anthology of short stories inspired by Octavia Butler and published by AK Press in 2015] reframed my love of science fiction as something that can benefit community. The editors primarily chose artists, activists, organizers — people who in their everyday lives work to make the world a better place, to engage with their creativity, to imagine different worlds and tell stories in the form of short fiction. That’s my first attempt at writing a story. I didn’t know what I was doing! And it changed my life.

More Octavia Butler

    After “Octavia’s Brood,” I heard that Octavia probably would’ve seen all this attention and wonder why it’s happening. That’s how strong her self-doubt was. Even when she was here with us, I don’t think she believed that people wanted to hear from her.

    The effort around bringing her stories to film on a mainstream scale has been in the works for a long time. I don’t know why it’s taking so long! Film is a long process, but some of the biggest names you could imagine have been interested in purchasing rights to Octavia Butler’s work.

    Gabriel Teodros’ personal recommendation

    I recommend reading “Parable of the Sower” and then “Parable of the Talents,” for so many reasons. In “Sower,” you have what feels like an apocalyptic scenario playing out in the United States; the rise in fascism and white Christian extremism; and a disabled Black girl named Lauren Olamina, who invents a religion and builds a community to survive it all. It’s like a story about now, but different. The story goes intergenerational in “Talents,” and we go further into the future to see the impact Lauren’s life has had on her daughter, and, to paraphrase Grace Lee Boggs, we see how every victory comes with a new set of contradictions.

    Gabriel Teodros is a hip-hop artist, writer, KEXP disc jockey and Clarion West graduate.

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