Scan barcode
A review by adamrshields
Children of God by Mary Doria Russell
5.0
Short Review: This is the sequel to The Sparrow. These two books really should be thought of as a single large book, because even thought the Sparrow ends, The Children of God picks up almost immediately after.
I think, once I finished, that the combined books are a meditation on Job. The problem of evil is discussed throughout (the author is Jewish but most of the characters are Jesuit priests). The Sparrow is often compared to The Book of Strange New Things, which I really liked. But other than both being about Christian missions to alien worlds and tragedy, they are very different books.
A note on format, because this is a book that has some strong language, discussion of rape and sex and war and death, I moved from audio to kindle for most of the book because I often have little ears running around that pick up more than I want them to. I also think that the kindle edition made it easier to track the story. The format of the book is a lot of jumping back in forth in time and space and the audio makes that harder to track. Also the alien and non-English names are easier for me to handle and track in print than in audio.
My full review, no spoilers, is on my blog at http://bookwi.se/children-of-god/
I think, once I finished, that the combined books are a meditation on Job. The problem of evil is discussed throughout (the author is Jewish but most of the characters are Jesuit priests). The Sparrow is often compared to The Book of Strange New Things, which I really liked. But other than both being about Christian missions to alien worlds and tragedy, they are very different books.
A note on format, because this is a book that has some strong language, discussion of rape and sex and war and death, I moved from audio to kindle for most of the book because I often have little ears running around that pick up more than I want them to. I also think that the kindle edition made it easier to track the story. The format of the book is a lot of jumping back in forth in time and space and the audio makes that harder to track. Also the alien and non-English names are easier for me to handle and track in print than in audio.
My full review, no spoilers, is on my blog at http://bookwi.se/children-of-god/