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Title: Parable of the Talents by Octavia E. Butler ISBN: 0-446-67578-4 Publisher: Warner Books Pub. Date: 01 January, 2000 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.43 (42 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: Using one's talents
Comment: Continuing from "Parable of the Sower", this book finds Lauren and her followers in Earthseed as they struggle to make their small community thrive in the time of chaos in what's left of the United States of America. Actually, this is all told through the eyes of Lauren's daughter Asha, who, through her mother's journals and teachings, tries to understand the mother she hardly knew. A religious zealot became President of the country, and Lauren's community was destroyed for its heathen views and all the children were placed with other families, so Asha grew up never knowing her mother. Asha weaves together her own story with that of Lauren's struggles to rebuild her Earthseed community, and she tells of how she finally met her birth mother with the unwitting assistance of Lauren's estranged gay brother. The first half of the book is a bleak report of the atrocities done by men to women and by zealous humans in the name of religious beliefs. It nearly overwhelms the story and detracts from what Butler is presenting, but eventually this improves and it becomes the compelling story that it ought to be, although overall it's not as potent as "Parable of the Sower". Like the first book (and books by Margaret Atwood, Sally Miller Gearhart, and Marge Piercy), Butler expresses a fascinating feminist view of the political, social, and personal turmoil our country faces, and the potential path that could be taken.
Rating: 4
Summary: Acorn Head Woman
Comment: Not necessarily a better read than Parable of the Sower, but more cleverly crafted. Interspliced with Olamina's journal entries is input from her adult daughter which adds a perspective not available in the first book.
To me Parable of the Sower had a greater feeling of urgency. Wondering how Olamina would survive propelled me through the pages. Parable of the Talents feels slower and more repetitive. I lost count of how many characters were raped or molested. The majority of characters feel so flat and insignificant, it's hard to be concerned when tragedy finally catches up with them. But I don't think that hurts the novel. At heart it's an examination of what could happen after an economic collapse, how different classes struggle to maintain what they have, and how opportunists try to take even more for themselves. More importantly it looks at how religion can become a trap for the desperate or a tool for setting them free.
While individual characters feel flat, the society Butler shows us feels very real. Clearly she's a well educated author, alert to the trends in modern politics and where they might be leading us. If you have any interest in anthropology, sociology, or politics you'll enjoy Parable of the Talents.
Rating: 5
Summary: A book worth teaching . . .
Comment: Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents are the best written of Butler's books. Stylistically, she just keeps improving as a writer. I understand sci-fi fans might want more science, but thse books are really morality tales about the path she sees our country taking--- and it's not for the faint of heart. Be forewarned, a point in the middle is so depressing I could barely keep reading, and I find the end heartbreaking despite the utopian possibilities offered by the end of Lauren's story. This book is most extraordinary because she frames Lauren's writing with her daughter's observations of her life, and readers are forced to interrogate Lauren's kind of new age spiritual politics with her daughter's embittered, ambivalence to religion and politics. Butler is always interested in how and how much people resist power, and in examining how people survive by doing things that no one would have imagined as a productive possibilities before. This book is worth teaching, as you can explore contemporary political conflict but also think about the allegory of resistance Butler presents here--- something revolutionary as opposed to something that accomodates old systems. I can't wait for the next one.
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Title: Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler ISBN: 0446601977 Publisher: Warner Books Pub. Date: 01 February, 1995 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: Mind of My Mind by Octavia E. Butler ISBN: 0446361887 Publisher: Warner Books Pub. Date: 01 August, 1994 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: Wild Seed by Octavia E. Butler ISBN: 0446606723 Publisher: Aspect Pub. Date: 01 February, 1999 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: Lilith's Brood by Octavia E. Butler ISBN: 0446676101 Publisher: Aspect Pub. Date: 01 June, 2000 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: Patternmaster by Octavia E. Butler ISBN: 0446362816 Publisher: Warner Books Pub. Date: 01 May, 1995 List Price(USD): $6.50 |
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