Ibi Zoboi debuted to immediate acclaim in 2017 with National Book Award finalist American Street, followed by a procession of other celebrated works. Zoboi’s debut contemporary fantasy, (S)kin (Versify, out now), is a novel in verse following an undocumented Caribbean mother and daughter who work for pennies by day, then shed their skin to feast on the life force of their enemies at night. The duo’s pursuit of the American dream connects them with Genevieve, a motherless biracial girl beginning to manifest the same powers. PW spoke with Zoboi about pushing the limits of one’s knowledge, the untapped potential of Caribbean folklore, and the pervasiveness of colorism.
What drew you to the idea of Caribbean folklore–inspired vampires?
This has been a long time coming—20 years, in fact. My first published writing was speculative fiction in adult publications. Right out of college, that’s what I was interested in writing. I wanted to write speculative fiction for adults because I wanted to do what Octavia Butler was doing, but for Haitian culture. At that time I was attending Haitian Vodou ceremonies and immersing myself in the culture. I learned that it was a pantheon just as deep and vast as Greek and Roman mythology. I wanted to write about it.
My first short story was published in 2004, in a book called Dark Matter: Reading the Bones. It was called “Old Flesh Song,” and based on the Old Hag folklore. I loved the idea of Black women who were domestic workers by day and vengeance-seeking vampires by night. Not like Dracula, but the vampire traditions of the Caribbean. That’s what brought me to (S)kin.
You pour your own life experience into your work. What motivated the complicated mother-daughter dynamics at play in (S)kin?
I didn’t grow up in this. I grew up in a very Catholic household in Haiti. Growing up Haitian, you know there’s something different about us. I’m learning about Haitian Vodou in school, I’m asking friends, “Where’s the next ceremony I can see?” But I’m keeping it away from my mother, even as others tell me, “Oh your mother, we all used to dance to this or knew these songs,” and grew up with this as part of their culture. Then you come to a new country and it’s like, No, we don’t do that no more. You leave those backwoods stories. But it’s part of your DNA.
Take [(S)kin character] Marisol. Her mother, Lourdes, wants her to have a better life, but they have to keep their abilities a secret. These transformations happen, but they fold it back in order to hide. Marisol doesn’t know whether she’s assimilating and discarding this part of herself. This is the mother-daughter dynamic when you’re an immigrant coming to a new place, trying to be upwardly mobile.
Discrimination based on skin color, features, and hair texture plays a prominent role in how differently Marisol, who has darker skin, and Genevieve, with lighter skin, navigate. Why was it important to contrast these two so starkly?
In writing these stories, I don’t think of intentionality. But there are some things that are subconscious in my mind. I’m a little light skinned, so what I get is texturism, because I’ve always had very short, kinky hair. While I was in high school, I saw colorism play out, featurism play out, texturism play out, but we didn’t have those words back then. Racial dynamics don’t stop at Black and white. It’s a class dynamic as well. All of that went into this idea of shedding your skin.
Would you like to come back to the world of (S)kin?
Absolutely. I’ve already built the world. I published “Old Flesh Song,” and I revisited it in a short story, “The Fire in Your Sky.” Patrice Caldwell edited an anthology, A Phoenix First Must Burn, speculative fiction featuring Black girls. It had “Kiss the Sun,” about girls at the resort where Lourdes and Marisol once lived and worked. I’ve been visiting this world over and over.
