LaGuardia (Hugo Award Winner)

by Nnedi Okorafor, Tana Ford (Illustrator)

Overview

Eisner and Hugo Award Winner!

Written by Nnedi Okorafor, Hugo and Nebula award-winning author and the writer of Marvel's Shuri, this deluxe trade paperback collects issues #1-#4 of the mini-series and includes artist sketches and afterword from the author.

In an alternate world where aliens have integrated with society, pregnant Nigerian-American doctor Future Nwafor Chukwuebuka has just smuggled an illegal alien plant named Letme Live through LaGuardia International and Interstellar Airport...and that's not the only thing she's hiding.

She and Letme become part of a community of human and alien immigrants; but as their crusade for equality continues and the birth of her child nears, Future—and her entire world—begins to change.

"Laguardia" is essential reading for our times." – Comicbook.com

"Classic speculative fiction at its best, coupled with an endearing protagonist, and a vibrant, living sci-fi world rendered by a fantastic art team." – Multiversity.com

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781506710754
Publisher:	Dark Horse Comics
Publication date:	07/30/2019
Pages:	136
Sales rank:	670,956
Product dimensions:	6.60(w) x 10.10(h) x 0.50(d)

About the Author

Nnedi Okorafor is an international award-winning novelist of African-based science fiction, fantasy and magical realism for both children and adults. Born in the United States to two Nigerian immigrant parents, Nnedi is known for weaving African culture into creative evocative settings and memorable characters. In a profile of Nnedi's work titled, "Weapons of Mass Creation", The New York Times called Nnedi's imagination "stunning".

Nnedi's books include:

Lagoon (a British Science Fiction Association Award finalist for Best Novel), Who Fears Death (a World Fantasy Award winner for Best Novel), The Book of Phoenix (an Arthur C. Clarke Award finalist), The Binti Trilogy (the first of which won both the Hugo and Nebula Awards for Best Novella and the second which is a Hugo Award finalist), Chicken in the Kitchen (winner of an Africana Book Award), Kabu Kabu (A Publisher's Weekly Best Book for Fall 2013), The Akata series (Akata Warrior being a finalist for the World Science Fiction Society Award), Zahrah the Windseeker (winner of the Wole Soyinka Prize for African Literature), The Shadow Speaker (a CBS Parallax Award winner), Long Juju Man (winner of the Macmillan Writers' Prize for Africa),

Comics:
Black Panther: Long Live the King (Marvel)
Antar: the Black Knight (IDW/Mirage Films)
LaGuardia (Dark Horse Comics)
Wakanda Forever (Marvel)

Editorial Reviews

05/20/2019

The Trump administration’s travel ban gets incisive sci-fi treatment in Hugo and Nebula award–winning author Okorafor’s tale of extraterrestrial immigrants. In a near-future New York, a Nigerian-American doctor named Future has a baby on the way whose parentage is “complicated.” She flees strife in Lagos and lands at LaGuardia smuggling an “illegal” refugee in her bag—a sentient universe-traveling plant whose species was wiped out by genocide. It names itself Letme Live and takes root in the yard of Future’s grandmother’s building. Later, Future returns to the airport to join massive protests, which include sides both for and against strict new immigration laws that ban aliens and human citizens of certain countries (who are suspected of having alien blood) from traveling to America. The political-is-personal narrative, wittily illustrated by Ford with vivid colors by Devlin, mixes playful contemporary references with the Afrofuturistic inspiration of Octavia Butler. “Aliens are people too,” reads a banner clutched by a four-armed blobby creature; another proclaims “Octavia warned us.” The aliens arrive in all shapes and sizes, and bring new biotechnologies, but struggle to coexist in peace. Like the best sci-fi, the storytelling speaks to the heart of current debates, as Future and her growing family fight to create a world—or even just find an apartment—where they can all survive (July)

Publishers Weekly

10/25/2019

In the latest from multi-award-winning author Okorafor ("Binti" trilogy), collaborating again with artist Ford (Black Panther: Long Live the King), with illustrations enhanced by a glowing color palette from Devlin, a fictional Lagos, Nigeria, has become the destination of choice for immigrant extraterrestrial species. In order to save the life of a plantlike alien from civil war, Dr. Future Chukwebuka (designed closely after Okorafor herself), flees Nigeria for New York to visit her grandmother, an immigration lawyer. Left behind is Citizen, the father of Future's unborn baby, who has unwittingly passed alien DNA to both mother and child. While character names and identities may be a tad unsubtle (e.g., a fugitive alien called Letme Live, Future's own baby is Future Citizen), Okorafor's treatment of this controversial real-world sociopolitical problem is both humanist and hopeful. VERDICT Speaking to the global immigration and refugee crises through the lens of Afrofuturism, this brilliant and decidedly progressive work will be an essential addition to most adult graphic novels collections. [See Martha Cornog's "Afrofuturism and More," LJ 11/19.]—Michael Dudley, Univ. of Winnipeg Lib., Man.

Library Journal