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4.25 AVERAGE
4.25 AVERAGE
adventurous
challenging
emotional
informative
inspiring
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
dark
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
To start with the good:
I very much liked the imagining of this dystopian world. It didn't seem like it was trying to do too much, and other than making the classic mistake of dystopian fiction of putting the date of the story too close in the future (written in 1993, set 2024-2027), it unfortunately felt like an extremely plausible future. No outrageous apocalypic events, just the slow economic and moral decline of a society as the government becomes more corrupt and serving to the rich, and as climate change slowly wreaks havoc with droughts, hurricanes, earthquakes etc. Give it 20-30 years, and this could certainly look like a reality.
To it's credit, this book also had many parallels with three other books I've read (mostly) in this genre: The Grapes of Wrath, The Death of Grass, and The Road. Perhaps this is more a comment on good dystopian literature sharing similar tropes, but I think it also shows how this book takes some key dystopian elements from these books to really set up a compelling narrative (at least for the first two, The Road was written after this). Of course, The Grapes of Wrath isn't a dystopian book in the traditional sense - TGoW is really just a powerful reimagining of the real hardships faced by migrant farm workers in 1930s California - but anyone who has read both these books will surely see the parallels in them, even if just to the historical events referenced in both.
I also thought the "hyperempathy" thing was an interesting element of the story. Perhaps more could've been done with it, but it seemed somewhat well-utilised.
On to the bad:
The religion and philosophy of "Earthseed" is a core theme of the book; "discovered" by the young protagonist, Lauren Olamina, and slowly developed and preached to people as the novel goes on. This is kind of fine in itself, but it's clearly something Butler wished her readers to really engage with, as each chapter opens with a passage from this fictional "Earthseed: The Books of the Living" work, basically Lauren's bible for this religion. Unfortunately, try as I might, I've not a spiritual bone in my body, and thus this Earthseed stuff fell on deaf ears. What we see of Earthseed and it's teachings doesn't do anything for me as the basis for a religion, and for me the passages don't have much virtue as poetry either. Maybe if I'd tried harder I could've connected to this more, but I feel like you could centre this around a human-focused "people need to help each other more" (put simply) philosophy and achieve a kind of similar result.
Also, the final "destiny" thing being to "root among the stars" felt a bit underdeveloped and also just impossible to work into the narrative in an understandable way. Rich people have turned on humanity, they're the only ones who would be able to afford to build rockets and the government is cutting those programs anyway, Lauren kind of admits the earth isn't worth/can't be saved, I don't see how it's all reconcilable? The book endswith them starting this small community on a farm anyway, this idea that they need to be self-sufficient, look after themselves (the last quarter where they know they're heading towards this place is quite "Death of Grass"), so why not just make the philosophy this more "community-centred" idea? Anyway I'm not sure I understand Earthseed and its place in the story at all really.
Also, I was really considering DNF-ing this book when I first realised thatLauren (just turned 18) and Bankole (57+) were about to get together. I mean she literally talks about how he's older than her dad, and he comments on feeling like a child molester! "Oh but love is love" give me a break, ick. I don't really feel like reading about a 57 year-old touching the breasts of a teenager thanks. That along with the Earthseed stuff kind of made me consider putting it down, but as I was over 50% through I figured I'd just speed up to the finish.
Overall it was kind of fine. The prose was very simplistic and conversational, mostly supposed to be the diary entries of the protagonist I guess. It made it easy to read, but left a little to be desired. Perhaps that's just down to the other types of books I'm used to reading though, I'm not sure. I see the sequel is also highly rated, I'm not sure I'll be reading it though, or at least not any time soon.
I very much liked the imagining of this dystopian world. It didn't seem like it was trying to do too much, and other than making the classic mistake of dystopian fiction of putting the date of the story too close in the future (written in 1993, set 2024-2027), it unfortunately felt like an extremely plausible future. No outrageous apocalypic events, just the slow economic and moral decline of a society as the government becomes more corrupt and serving to the rich, and as climate change slowly wreaks havoc with droughts, hurricanes, earthquakes etc. Give it 20-30 years, and this could certainly look like a reality.
To it's credit, this book also had many parallels with three other books I've read (mostly) in this genre: The Grapes of Wrath, The Death of Grass, and The Road. Perhaps this is more a comment on good dystopian literature sharing similar tropes, but I think it also shows how this book takes some key dystopian elements from these books to really set up a compelling narrative (at least for the first two, The Road was written after this). Of course, The Grapes of Wrath isn't a dystopian book in the traditional sense - TGoW is really just a powerful reimagining of the real hardships faced by migrant farm workers in 1930s California - but anyone who has read both these books will surely see the parallels in them, even if just to the historical events referenced in both.
I also thought the "hyperempathy" thing was an interesting element of the story. Perhaps more could've been done with it, but it seemed somewhat well-utilised.
On to the bad:
The religion and philosophy of "Earthseed" is a core theme of the book; "discovered" by the young protagonist, Lauren Olamina, and slowly developed and preached to people as the novel goes on. This is kind of fine in itself, but it's clearly something Butler wished her readers to really engage with, as each chapter opens with a passage from this fictional "Earthseed: The Books of the Living" work, basically Lauren's bible for this religion. Unfortunately, try as I might, I've not a spiritual bone in my body, and thus this Earthseed stuff fell on deaf ears. What we see of Earthseed and it's teachings doesn't do anything for me as the basis for a religion, and for me the passages don't have much virtue as poetry either. Maybe if I'd tried harder I could've connected to this more, but I feel like you could centre this around a human-focused "people need to help each other more" (put simply) philosophy and achieve a kind of similar result.
Also, the final "destiny" thing being to "root among the stars" felt a bit underdeveloped and also just impossible to work into the narrative in an understandable way. Rich people have turned on humanity, they're the only ones who would be able to afford to build rockets and the government is cutting those programs anyway, Lauren kind of admits the earth isn't worth/can't be saved, I don't see how it's all reconcilable? The book ends
Also, I was really considering DNF-ing this book when I first realised that
Overall it was kind of fine. The prose was very simplistic and conversational, mostly supposed to be the diary entries of the protagonist I guess. It made it easy to read, but left a little to be desired. Perhaps that's just down to the other types of books I'm used to reading though, I'm not sure. I see the sequel is also highly rated, I'm not sure I'll be reading it though, or at least not any time soon.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Death, Gun violence, Rape, Violence
Moderate: Child death, Drug use, Blood, Cannibalism, Death of parent
Minor: Racism, Slavery, Police brutality, Grief
dark
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
challenging
dark
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
challenging
dark
hopeful
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
brilliant and haunting. this should be required reading everywhere.
challenging
dark
reflective
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
The concept of this book is so incredible. There are so many parallels to be found with our world today with religion, modern day slavery, and policing. I’m truly shocked about the intelligence and insightfulness necessary to write this book. I think my main problem with the book is that the author just covers so many themes that she doesn’t really go into detail in any of them, and it just feels a little messy. Also, I didn’t rly feel connected to the main character. I also feel like her hyper empathy is low key an afterthought ? Like it doesn’t rly contribute to who she is as a character. I’m still giving it 4 stars though just because of how classic it is and rly paved the way for a whole new genre.
adventurous
challenging
emotional
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
challenging
dark
reflective
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Absolutely captivating. I want to compare it to Atwood, to McCarthy's "The Road", to that scene in "Beau is afraid" where he walks through the city, but all comparisons are just not enough - this is a masterpiece in its own right. Eerily accurate portrait of a near-to-current future, great world build, attention to details and even educational (don't think everybody knows about company-owned towns).