Октавия Батлер - все книги по циклам и сериям | Книги по порядку

Человечество в результате войны сделало Землю непригодной для обитания. Выжившим грозит полное вымирание. Но их спасают появившиеся невесть откуда чужие — сохраняют им жизнь, чтобы люди помогли освоить и заселить эту планету. Героине этого романа предстоит научить людей сотрудничать с чужаками, любить их, стать членами их сообщества…

In this sequel to Dawn, Lilith Iyapo has given birth to what looks like a normal human boy named Akin. But Akin actually has five parents: a male and female human, a male and female Oankali, and a sexless Ooloi. The Oankali and Ooloi are part of an alien race that rescued humanity from a devastating nuclear war, but the price they exact is a high one. The aliens are compelled to genetically merge their species with other races, drastically altering both in the process. On a rehabilitated Earth, this "new" race is emerging through human/Oankali/Ooloi mating, but there are also "pure" humans who choose to resist the aliens and the salvation they offer. These resisters are sterilized by the Ooloi so that they cannot reproduce the genetic defect that drives humanity to destroy itself, but otherwise they are left alone (unless they become violent). When the resisters kidnap young Akin, the Oankali choose to leave the child with his captors, for he the most "human" of the Oankali children will decide whether the resisters should be given back their fertility and freedom, even though they will only destroy themselves again.

This is the second volume in Octavia Butler's Xenogenesis series, a powerful tale of alien existence.

his way.

Human and Oankali have been mating since the aliens first came to Earth to rescue the few survivors of an annihilating nuclear war. The Oankali began a massive breeding project, guided by the Ooloi, a sexless subspecies capable of manipulating DNA, in the hope of eventually creating a perfect starfaring race. Jodahs is supposed to be just another hybrid of human and Oankali, but as he begins his transformation to adulthood he finds himself becoming Ooloi—the first ever born to a human mother.

As his body changes, Jodahs develops the ability to shapeshift, manipulate matter, and cure or create disease at will. If this frightened young man is able to master his new identity, Jodahs could prove the savior of what’s left of mankind. Or, if he is not careful, he could become a plague that will destroy this new race once and for all.

Octavia E. Butler once gleefully described her eerie novella "Bloodchild", the title piece of Bloodchild and Other Stories as her "pregnant man story". "Bloodchild" explores the paradoxes of power and inequality and starkly portrays the experience of a class who, like women throughout most of history, are valued chiefly for their reproductive capacities. After it appeared in Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine, it won both the Hugo and Nebula Awards, SF's highest honors.

"Speech Sounds", which also won the Hugo Award, and "Crossover", Butler's first published story, both describe women continuing to endure after their lives have become unbearable. "The Evening and the Morning and the Night" wrestles with the double-edged sword of illness and talent. "Near of Kin", Butler's only non-SF story, describes a young woman coming to terms with the death of the mother who abandoned her.

Also included are two autobiographical essays, "Positive Obsession" and "Furor Scribendi", about what Butler calls "the art, the craft, and the business of writing".