Feminine Rage & the End of the World: The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin
“We are the gods in chains and this is not. Rusting. Right.”
There are days when all I want to do is rot in bed. I want to swaddle myself in blankets and let myself decompose. I turn to my side, and my phone charges upright on its magnetic pedestal, and the news trickles in like a tidal wave: more chains around my wrists, more lead weights at my ankles, more water flooding my lungs. I get up, and the blood flowing through my veins sink to my feet to force me to crawl until I can stand.
Before all this, the dreams were enough. The hope for a better future propelled me across oceans and continents. Planes were ridden with starry eyes and jittering excitement.
But some days, what gets me off my knees and onto my feet isn’t hope—it’s spite.
The Fifth Season - by N.K. Jemisin
The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin follows the story of Essun, a woman devastated by grief and loss. After her husband killed her son and left with her daughter, she is left to traverse the continent known as the Stillness for the wreckage of her family. Trouble comes when the once-mighty empire known as Sanze collapses and a red rift splits the land in half. Ash covers all sunlight and stains the water, and with the breakdown of one empire comes an impending war for the next. But Essun doesn’t care about that. For her daughter, she’ll shatter the world herself.
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“So you decide not to wait for death to come.”
After losing her son, it’s only a matter of time until Essun’s neighbors find out why and come after her too. In the land of the Stillness, orogenes are people who can redirect the energy of the earth at will. In the face of fear or anger, they can create quakes that rattle the ground beneath them and tsunamis to swallow their enemies whole. This power comes with the hatred of those who don’t have it. If orogenes are not controlled, they are killed or worse. Essun was one, and so was her son, and that was why he was murdered. So, she has to leave home lest death come for her too.
And so I stand in the morning, lest death come for me too.
I make my coffee, rub the sleep out of my eyes. I have music follow me through each step of my routine until I’m all the way out the door and at work. I ignore the way my joints scream at movement, tape up the parts of me that won’t stay still, and plaster a smile on my face before pretending nothing was wrong at all.
In an age where words spread like wildfire at our fingertips, it can be hard not to entertain them. And while fire is warm, it can also burn.
I’ve found that there’s a lot of burning lately.
But the world goes on, and as long as it turns, I will keep moving. Because I have things I love. I may not have a daughter like Essun that needs saving, but there are children that need to be taught literacy and a dog that needs walking. There are words begging to be written and pages yet to be flipped. Flowers that still need smelling.
And every day, when people stare at my wheelchair or my KT tape, when they ask the apparently all-important question of, “what’s wrong with you?”: I’ll let it fuel instead of shatter me.
“This is what you are at the vein, this small and petty creature… You may be a monster, but you are also great.”
I don’t know when exactly it happened, or maybe it’s been building up my whole life, but eventually I stopped doing things people told me to do.
I’m told to write with my right hand and not with my left? No, thank you. My left is good enough as is, and my right can barely manage half a keyboard, let alone the fine motor skills to move a pen. I’m told to pray for a cure for my genetic condition? I think I’ll stick to the KT tape, thank you. I’ve found it more useful, and I say that as someone who had a catholic upbringing. I’m too loud? Let me put it in bold, italics, and underline it just to make sure you really understand what I’m saying.
The stock market might’ve crashed, but I’m busy opening a bookstore. I have events to plan, websites to fix, blogs to write, drinks to try. When I’m not doing that, I have kids to teach, a dog to walk, a body to fight, a podcast to record, and never-ending photos to edit. People tell me not to dance; I dance. People tell me not to argue; I argue. People tell me not to start a business; I’ve got two. I really have no time to pencil in “care about your opinion.” Maybe catch me next year?
Similarly, throughout the story of Essun, we learn about her past experiences and how she came to be the ruthless mother she is. I won’t spoil much, but I find a lot in common with her and I’m sure, reader, you will too. A school you have no choice but to attend, an education telling you how to think instead of teaching you how to form an opinion, and an adulthood where you grapple with what you thought you knew.
I don’t mind being a black sheep if it means doing great things with my life. Essun won’t mind ripping the world to shreds if it means saving her daughter.
“It’s a gift if it makes us better. It’s a curse if we let it destroy us. You decide that—not the instructors, or the Guardians, or anyone else.”
I go to sleep wishing I could stay awake for longer.
There is so much life has to offer, sure. Hope creeps in through the day, through emails saying I’m moving forward and friends trusting me to help them when they need it. Hope doesn’t keep you warm at night, though, when you’re editing at three in the morning and your head starts to pound.
There is wildfire at my fingertips, and it is hard not to entertain it.
Even when the world splits in half and covers the ground in ash. Even when you come home to find out it’s been torn apart and broken by the shake. Even when you realize the people you love can hurt you just the same. Essun will keep moving, and I will too.
If Essun doesn’t mind fracturing the earth, I won’t mind burning a few bridges if it keeps me going. And I will. I know because I have a pretty good survival rate thus far.
(If you’re reading this: so do you.)
Fire is warm, and it can also burn.
