4/4/26
The great internal debates this week are whether or not I should shave off my now-epic beard, whether or not I should buy a new suit for the Bram Stoker Awards, whether or not I should drive to Los Angeles rather than fly, and whether or not I should plant a garden this year. I’m still undecided on the beard. I think I will buy the new suit, but only because I’ve lost some weight and I’m not sure the 6 of them hanging in my closet will fit anymore, and I don’t know where the hell I’d take them to have them altered. Are tailors even a thing anymore? I mean, I’m sure they exist in places like New York City and Los Angeles and Miami, but do they exist in rural central Pennsylvania? Or are they like shoe cobblers? The trip to L.A. — I was invited to be part of something very special, and I absolutely do not want to miss it, but I’m also really not crazy about these airport TSA lines or anything else connected with air travel in 2026. Driving Red Sonja across the country appeals to me, but that would also be a lot of lost writing time, and presents its own travel challenges given the cost of fuel. And as for the garden? Fuck it. I don’t have time for that this year. There’s nothing better than walking outside, picking a cucumber or tomato that you grew yourself, and making that lunch, straight from the garden — but grocery stores and supermarkets are a thing that exist, and this summer has just gotten too busy.
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Women In Horror Year: Day 4
Let’s Play White by Chesya Burke
White brings with it dreams of respect, of wealth, of simply being treated as a human being. It’s the one thing Walter will never be. But what if he could play white, the way so many others seem to do? Would it bring him privilege or simply deny the pain? The title story in this collection asks those questions, and then moves on to challenge notions of race, privilege, personal choice, and even life and death with equal vigor.
From the spectrum spanning despair and hope in “What She Saw When They Flew Away” to the stark weave of personal struggles in “Chocolate Park,” Let’s Play White speaks with the voices of the overlooked and unheard. “I Make People Do Bad Things” shines a metaphysical light on Harlem’s most notorious historical madame, and then, with a deft twist into melancholic humor, “Cue: Change” brings a zombie-esque apocalypse, possibly for the betterment of all mankind.
Gritty and sublime, the stories of Let’s Play White feature real people facing the worlds they’re given, bringing out the best and the worst of what it means to be human. If you’re ready to slip into someone else’s skin for a while, then it’s time to come play white.
Grammy nominee Nikki Giovanni compared Chesya’s stories in this book to the work of Octavia Butler and later-career Toni Morrison, and both are valid comparisons, because yes, there is light and magic in these stories. But there is also a sinister, ruthless undercurrent to them. Horror fiction is at its best when the author holds a mirror up to humanity. And some of the reflections that Chesya shows us are unsettling, to say the least.
Let’s Play White has never, in my opinion, gotten the accolades it deserves. Don’t misunderstand. Published back in 2011, it received some good reviews, and was enjoyed by a number of readers. Indeed, for many readers, it served as their introduction to Chesya’s work. But for horror fiction that was about something more than just jump scares and “Wouldn’t it be cool if…”, Let’s Play White should have landed with the force of ten nuclear bombs. Had it been published a decade later, perhaps it might have. The easy analogy would be that Chesya walked so that today’s generation of authors (particularly women of color examining their experience via horror) could run, but I think the better analogy is that Chesya charged the battlefield so they could follow. If you’ve never read the book, you need to discover it. if you read it a long time ago, you need to reread it.
Let’s Play White is currently available in paperback and eBook from Apex Books.
