In the introduction to Thyme Travellers: An Anthology of Palestinian Speculative Fiction, a collection of 14 stories by Palestinian writers from Canada and around the world, editor Sonia Sulaiman writes, “Whether you are a Palestinian or an ally, I welcome you to use this book as a stepping stone, to seek out the work of Palestinian writers and to take action to resist the oppression of Palestinians.”

The opening story, Jumaana Abdu’s “Down Under,” in which two women dig a tunnel from Australia to Palestine, quickly draws the reader right into its world and the themes of the book. What is one’s connection to a place they have never been to, a place that has been taken by force and violence? This underlying question posed by Abdu is a central concern across the collection. How do different generations and the diaspora of Palestinians arrive in Palestine – in the worlds of this anthology where arriving in Palestine, in fact, becomes possible? In “Down Under,” Abdu writes that there is no hierarchy of Palestinian-ness between those who know the land and those who do not, especially as “forced amnesia is a war tactic; that’s what you’re facing. But you’re digging so deep to love what you can’t remember.”

Rana Othman’s “Soul Searching” is infused with magic, but begins with a very real description of how 12-year-old children get to school in Jerusalem from the West Bank. “Both the boys’ and girls’ schools didn’t start until 7:45, but they needed the time to pass through the maḥsoom, which is what the Israeli soldiers called their military checkpoint. This made timing unpredictable. Depending on the soldiers’ mood, passing through could take anywhere from a few minutes to several hours.” In Samah Serour Fadil’s “Gaza Luna,” the narrator’s “body knew what to do when the raids began.” These dystopian descriptions in speculative narratives are, however, pulled from reality. Sulaiman’s request to “use this book as a stepping stone,” becomes more and more pertinent with every story. And the thread echoed throughout the stories is stated explicitly by Sara Solara: “In a free Palestine, nobody can stop me from going back home.”

Stories such as Karl El-Koura’s “Cyrano de AI” and Nadia Shammas’s “The Centre of the Universe” use science fiction and technology in various captivating ways. El-Koura explores how generational grief and pain creates the circumstance whereby the narrator finds himself relying on AI to the point it has a detrimental effect on his life. Shammas’s story asks: In the realm of virtual reality, how horrific does the violence need to be for a non-Palestinian to notice?

This is also an anthology that affirms a queer Palestine. In Nadia Afifi’s “The Generation Chip,” in a world where it has become possible to gift one’s dreams and memories to future generations, a character states, “let people see that there were queer people in our society.” In Sara Solara’s “In the Future, We Can Go Back Home,” she asks: “Will the land love me back in all my queerness?” Both of these stories feature characters who learn about their grandmothers’ queerness, speaking to differences in Palestinian society as well as the importance of matrilineal legacy within Palestinian culture.

In Thyme Travellers, writers imagine Palestine in an alternate present and in the future. Some stories lean into science fiction while others employ fabulism; in many, Palestine is a beacon used by a character to chart their course, while others look inwards to memories and simulations. But across the varied narratives, the writers explore generational connections, especially as a way of resistance to colonial violence.