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A review by bites_of_books
Wild Seed by Octavia E. Butler
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
I did not expect to read this book this fast! I am reading it for a book club and thought it would take me longer to read but ended up finishing it in 3 days ha!
Wild Seed follows two immortal beings: Anyanwu is an African woman who is ~300 years old, she has self-healing and shape-shifting abilities. Doro is an even older man who has the ability to take over people's bodies and thus cannot be killed. While Anyanwu cares about preserving her people and descendants, Doro is experimenting and breeding people left and right and trying to create magical/unique/different beings.
This book is also set from 1690-1840 and takes us from Africa to the United States. Therefore, slavery and racism is something that is in the background but never a main plot thread.
I absolutely loved Anyanwu, she's such an interesting character and I kept rooting for her to live the life she wanted and just be at peace. Meanwhile, Doro is a clearly unlikeable character who doesn't seem to be able to understand how to do the right thing. The power struggle between these two characters is next level. We are talking immortal beings, the only two on Earth who are trying to "win" while basically being each other's salvation.
Death and violence are everywhere in this book, it's quite graphic at times and difficult to read, some scenes are very shocking so do read carefully. I'd definitely recommend this to anyone who thinks they've read all that science fiction can offer since this is a very unique book that surprised me left and right.
I think I will be thinking about this book for a long time to come and I can't wait to continue with the Patternmaster series.
Wild Seed follows two immortal beings: Anyanwu is an African woman who is ~300 years old, she has self-healing and shape-shifting abilities. Doro is an even older man who has the ability to take over people's bodies and thus cannot be killed. While Anyanwu cares about preserving her people and descendants, Doro is experimenting and breeding people left and right and trying to create magical/unique/different beings.
This book is also set from 1690-1840 and takes us from Africa to the United States. Therefore, slavery and racism is something that is in the background but never a main plot thread.
I absolutely loved Anyanwu, she's such an interesting character and I kept rooting for her to live the life she wanted and just be at peace. Meanwhile, Doro is a clearly unlikeable character who doesn't seem to be able to understand how to do the right thing. The power struggle between these two characters is next level. We are talking immortal beings, the only two on Earth who are trying to "win" while basically being each other's salvation.
Death and violence are everywhere in this book, it's quite graphic at times and difficult to read, some scenes are very shocking so do read carefully. I'd definitely recommend this to anyone who thinks they've read all that science fiction can offer since this is a very unique book that surprised me left and right.
I think I will be thinking about this book for a long time to come and I can't wait to continue with the Patternmaster series.