Graceful Burdens - Roxane Gay - ★★★★.¼

AUTHOR: Roxane Gay

SERIES: Out of Line

GENRE: Short Story, Dystopian.

RATING: 4.25 stars.

In a Nutshell: After a long time, an Amazon Original Story that impressed me! Would have loved for this to be a novel. But even as is, it’s quite a thought-provoking read.

Story Synopsis:

In some dystopian future not too far ahead, there’s a baby library where a woman can borrow a baby for a few days.

Sidra: A caretaker who is chosen to work with the babies at the library as she isn’t fond of them.

Hadley: A woman not licensed to procreate, though she longs to have a baby.

Seraphina: A woman licensed to procreate, but hates her husband and kids and llongs to escape.

How are the lives of these three women connected? Read and find out.

This is one of the standalone short stories in the ‘Out of Line’ collection, described on Amazon as “an incisive collection of funny, enraging, and hopeful stories of women’s empowerment and escape.”

I can’t remember the last time I read an Amazon Original Story from start to end without zoning out even once. (I went through my shelves to check this out. It was in November 2022, when I read Kate Quinn’s mind-blowing “Signal Moon”.) Right at the start, the concept of a ‘baby library’ blew my mind. (Not gonna lie – I would have happily visited this library every day and played with all the babies until the librarians drove me away for making too much noise!) Though the story has just 21 pages, we still know the essentials about how the library functions.

We see the story from the view of the three main women characters mentioned above, each of whom is so distinct in their personality and preferences. I loved how the author made them seem real without resorting to clichés, and how their personality is carved in detail even within the limited page space they have. Hardly does a short story impress me so much with its character development.

I also enjoyed the explanation of how the world functioned in terms of licenses for procreating. The process was written about in such a casual way that it takes time to accept the tyranny of such a forced decision. I haven’t yet read Margaret Atwood’s ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’, but based on what I have heard, there might be some similarity in the concepts. Perhaps my lack of familiarity with the popular novel worked in my favour.

Coincidentally, the only other story I have read so far from this series, ‘Halfway to Free’, is also set around women who aren’t allowed to have children. That story actually seemed futuristic because of its tech, thereby distancing it from our time. But ‘Graceful Burden’, because of its barely-there futuristic elements, seems like it can fit into the contemporary world.

Two reasons why I am not rating this higher.

First, there are a few things that stay unanswered in this story. Like, what’s the time setting? It seems to be the near future but isn’t dystopian enough. There are some gaps in the second half. I am not going into those as they are spoilers, but I’ll just say that it’s not fun to fill in multiple plot gaps without adequate context.

Second, I wanted to know these characters and this world more. It offered so much potential as a novel that to see it as a short story, albeit a complete one, is a bit disappointing.

Regardless, even at this length, the story is power-packed. It will raise plenty of questions in your mind, not all of which will have a definite answer.

Definitely recommended if you want to try out an interesting short story with a mildly dystopian setting and intriguing character perspectives.

This standalone story is a part of the “Out Of Line” collection, and is currently available free to Amazon Prime subscribers.