Aspects of identify

Kiera’s obligation to represent different versions of blackness for different audiences
- white school peers
- boyfriend
- parents
- players
Individuals viewed as representations of assumed uniform groups
Code switching
- the “voice”
Identity markers
- hair
- speech
- attire & physical presentation including skin tone
Naming
- nicknames, choosing a name, the history of name erasure and imposition for Black Americans
  - Emerald
  - Cicada
  - Jamal Rice
  - Malcolm
- inculcated names
  - Jefferson
  - Civil War
Characterization
- Kiera
- Malcolm
- Steph
- Harper
- Mother
Safe spaces
- Are even virtual spaces safe for Kiera (and perhaps Black people)?
- Fantasy is colonized.
  - Are there alternatives such as Afrofuturism?

Narrative perspective
- What kind of narrator is Kiera?
The effects of our acts of reading
The book shifts through different character perspectives
- But are they different? What might be the effect of their similarities and differences, given the textual focus on virtual personas?

Can race-based policies address systemic racism? Should nothing be based on race, or are those rules only for a perfect world, not one that already has injustice?
Is technology neutral, or does it create bad and good?
In what ways do questions of feminism (and intersectionality) appear in the text?