that is NOT cool

[kjpepper]

I can't find any official news articles on this, but there's a fair amount of blogsphere postings about Octavia Butler's sudden death yesterday.

I met her two years ago when she came to speak to Bill Oram's class on science fiction/speculative fiction... Almost a decade before that I stayed up all night scaring the crap out of myself by reading Kindred, and afterwards deciding I wanted to be her when I grew up. I still do on some level. She was a fantastic writer, and still remains one of the strongest black voices in an otherwise fairly lily white genre.

She will be sorely missed.

Comments

[carolatina.livejournal.com]

Oh no. Oh no no no.

I had forgotten that you met her. And I had forgotten that I always wanted to take that class! Man, this is sad news.

[rhipowered.livejournal.com]

I remember when she came to speak, too...she will be missed indeed.

I posted this also on your ljblackfolk post

[guitbowl.livejournal.com]

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2002831136_webbutlerobit26.html

SEATTLE – Octavia E. Butler, the first black woman to gain national prominence as a science fiction writer, died after falling and striking her head on the cobbled walkway outside her home, a close friend said Sunday. She was 58.

Butler was found outside her home in the north Seattle suburb of Lake Forest Park on Friday. She had suffered from high blood pressure and heart trouble and could only take a few steps without stopping for breath, said Leslie Howle, who knew Butler for two decades and works at the Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame in Seattle.