Fire on the Mountain

1988 Bisson, Terry [Ballantine] (1942-2024). Fire on the Mountain. New York: Arbor House. Rpt. Oakland, CA: PM Press, 2009 with an “Introduction” by Mumia Abu-Jamal (b. Wesley Cook in 1954) from Death Row, where he has been since 1995. An excerpt from the 2009 ed. was published in Octavia’s Brood: Science Fiction Stories from Social Justice Movements. Ed. Walidah Imarisha and adrienne maree brown (Oakland, CA: AK Press and the Institute for Anarchist Studies, 2015), 225-38. Merril, SFF

According to Bisson, the basis of the novel is thinking about what would happen if the abolitionist John Brown (1800-59) had been successful, with most of the novel on the history of the successful revolt and its effects. There is a prosperous, independent black state, Nova Africa, in the U.S. South and the North, now the United Socialist States of America or U.S.S.A., is also becoming prosperous. For John Brown’s own eutopia, see 1858 Brown.