This compact volume collects three different works: a 2016 novella The Atheist in the Attic originally published in Conjunctions, a 1998 essay on "Racism and Science Fiction," and an original interview between Delany and the editor of the Outspoken Authors series, Terry Bisson. The interview is a bit unfocused but gives a nice overview of Delany's recent and major engagements, projects, etc. and elaborates on biographical trivia. The eponymous novella is a colorful and densely packed historical narrative recalled by an aged Leibniz of a meeting with Spinoza. It meditates on class and ethnic antipathies, the overlapping territories of poetry and philosophy, and much more that re-reading would illuminate further. It is Delany's essay "Racism and Science Fiction" which easily shines the brightest. Combining anecdote and analysis, he gives a well-measured, original, and historically insightful treatment of black authorship and reception in SF and its progenitors. Mandatory reading in whatever collection you can find it!