The Space Between Worlds

Throughout the novel’s social hierarchy, how do acts of naming and renaming function as tools of survival and assertions of power?

How does Cara ultimately manage to synthesize and reject the philosophies of Adam Bosch and Jean Sanogo, who represent opposing forms of adaptation to a corrupt system?

How does Johnson use the physical body as a site of trauma, memory, and identity throughout the narrative?

Analyze the multiple meanings of the titular “space between worlds.” How do Johnson’s descriptions of key settings explore the idea of existing “in between”?

How does The Space Between Worlds reinvent common dystopian tropes through the specific lens of Afrofuturism? Discuss at least three specific examples in your response.

The Eldridge Institute’s power is built on controlling technology and information. How do its manipulation, restriction, and theft of data function as the primary tools of oppression in the novel? How Cara’s rebellion become an act of reclaiming and redeploying that same information?

Explore the relationship between Cara and her doppelgänger, Nelline. How does Nelline’s character challenge Cara’s sense of moral superiority and force her to confront her own capacity for selfishness?

Trace Dell Ikari’s character arc from a rigid enforcer of institutional rules to a key figure in Cara’s rebellion. How does her transformation challenge the novel’s otherwise stark division between Wiley City and Ashtown?