You may have noticed that all four of my previous recommendations are by authors of African descent. Why? Not because we’re the only ones who write about polyamory in SFF, I’m sure. Nor because that’s all I read. As proof, my fifth recommendation is the 1997 novel Black Wine, by the inimitable–and European-descended–Candas Jane Dorsey. In this—fantasy? fable? far-future science fiction? whatever it is—dirigible sailors formally bond with one another in families of three or more. Five adults is the usual number, and these romantic, sexual, and domestic circles are called, unsurprisingly, “hands,” with individual members known as “fingers.” Slippery as the book’s genre, Dorsey’s depiction of gender, sexuality, and love rides meandering currents through strange lands and interesting times, with the claspings of the sailors’ hands among its happiest moments.