A colorful, engaging urban fantasy set in New York, N.K. Jemisin’s The City We Became (2020) is quite a departure from the Broken Earth trilogy. The results aren’t as breathtaking, but it’s still a rich, enjoyable read that takes an inventive speculative lens to contemporary issues.
Fantastical weirdness begins when Manny, a newcomer to the Big Apple, claws through a case of sudden-onset amnesia to discover that he, well, may have just become the living avatar of the borough of Manhattan. Something mysterious and supernatural has kicked off, a threat represented by “the Woman in White,” a ghostly figure whose appearance portends great jeopardy for the city. Manny soon learns that he’s not alone: there are five avatars, regular humans who have transformed into living embodiments of their boroughs and imbued with special powers. As they come together, they learn they may be the last hope for saving New York from a powerful inter-dimensional invader.
The world of The City We Became is vibrantly realized and memorably populated. Held up against the massive scope and dire intensity of the Broken Earth books, it’s surprisingly playful, leading to breezy readability. The world-building, on the other hand, feels underbaked at first, with an “anything-goes” zaniness. Since the protagonists aren’t in the know and are figuring out the threat as they go, the plot has a seat-of-the-pants randomness that doesn’t always make the stakes clear. Ultimately, a certain world-building rigor does underlie the scenario, and it’s a great conceit, but it maybe doesn’t emerge early enough. Some caveats, then, but overall an entertaining read with an intriguing premise and an effective core metaphor.
