Helen Oyeyemi’s short story collection What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours is one of those books and reading it is quite possibly one of the best things to happen to me in 2020. More book recommendations by me at Sometimes you open a book and such magic and wonder floods out of the pages, sweeping you up in a current as it washes you from your daily life to blissfully drown in its words. With regards to Riverhead and Goodreads for the beautiful (deckle-edged! What?!) advance copy, which I was lucky enough to win in a recent giveaway. And yes, I realize the strangeness of referring to Oyeyemi as a realist when her work is so clearly fantastical, but her characters-these are people I recognize, that are real, that could exist somewhere and have something important to say, even though history up to this point has told them in no uncertain terms that they are insignificant due to their gender or skin tone or sexuality, and therefore not worthy of a voice.

I wish I had encountered books like this in my college English curriculum-I think it would have totally floored me to read about the world as it actually is, as opposed to how it was, for privileged white men, hundreds of years ago. I still don’t know if I did or not, even after reading it through twice. In fact, when I finished the first story, “Books and Roses,” I flipped right back to the beginning and started again, convinced I’d missed something. I’m not a big re-reader, but this collection seems ripe for revisiting. Oyeyemi will never let you get comfortable, but if you strap on your weight belt and bring the intensity, her brand of magical realism will slowly coalesce into something you can hold, loosely, if not fully grasp. In much the same way as a good, hard workout eventually leads to an endorphin-fueled breakthrough, Oyeyemi’s short stories eventually clarified for me, and what began as a veins-bulging effort relaxed into a steady rhythm that I could keep pace with. And then she'll blow her whistle in your face and cheerfully scream at you to get a move on. At some point, you’re going to find yourself splayed out on the mat, panting like an animal and protesting that it’s too hard, you can’t do one more set.

Reading Helen Oyeyemi is like working out with a friendly but very aggressive personal trainer.

What is not yours is not yours summary