Parable of the Talents
Ratings106
Average rating4.3
15
Ratings106
Average rating4.3
Winner of the Nebula Award for Best Novel: The powerful and compelling sequel to the dystopian classic Parable of the Sower Lauren Olamina was only eighteen when her family was killed, and anarchy encroached on her Southern California home. She fled the war zone for the hope of quiet and safety in the north. There she founded Acorn, a peaceful community based on a religion of her creation, called Earthseed, whose central tenet is that God is change. Five years later, Lauren has married a doctor and given birth to a daughter. Acorn is beginning to thrive. But outside the tranquil group’s walls, America is changing for the worse. Presidential candidate Andrew Steele Jarret wins national fame by preaching a return to the values of the American golden age. To his marauding followers, who are identified by their crosses and black robes, this is a call to arms to end religious tolerance and racial equality—a brutal doctrine they enforce by machine gun. And as this band of violent extremists sets its deadly sights on Earthseed, Acorn is plunged into a harrowing fight for its very survival. Taking its place alongside Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, Butler’s eerily prophetic novel offers a terrifying vision of our potential future, but also one of hope. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Octavia E. Butler including rare images from the author’s estate.
Featured Series
2 primary booksEarthseed is a 2-book series with 2 primary works first released in 1984 with contributions by Octavia E. Butler and Octavia E. Butler.
Reviews with the most likes.
Back during the election, I think I remember Octavia Butler and this book specifically being referenced as eerily prescient. I don't think I clued in to how specifically prescient it was in that the nation would elect a reactionary demagogue working from a elitist form of Christian values who literally uses “make America great again” as his tag line. Guys, we weren't even recovering from an Apocalypse when it happened...
But unsettlingly accurate future visions aside, this is an unsurprisingly amazing book. It is vast, encompassing both Olamina's story after founding Acorn and her daughter's story and opinions as a frame. It speaks a lot towards the imperfections that come with being human, the betrayals which can so quickly escalate to horrific, as the traitors and bystanders repeatedly justify their actions and move along. It forces us to look at even what the protagonist justifies, and then what excuses we ourselves make, what moral compromises would we rather just not think about.
Butler pulls no punches, and I often struggled to get through because I couldn't handle that much vicarious suffering. Her prose makes Sharers of us all. She was a master, fully deserving of her acclaim and reputation, and this duology in particular are necessary reading in America's current climate.
Complex and rich, sad and magnificent, timely and intemporal this book doesn't really need my review.
This book has frightened me...it's frightened me in the same way “A Handmaid's Tale” once frightened me. It's not hard to imagine a societal breakdown such as the one portrayed in “Talents”...a breakdown where the disparity between rich and poor is so vast and the atrocities done in the name of “God” so great. The descriptions of company towns, reeducation camps, neoconservative religious political leaders...it just doesn't sound that farfetched. Butler knows how to spin a yarn in such a way as to keep me unsettled and almost despondant throughout the entire prose. I know Earthseed is supposed to be a comfort, but all I can see or feel is the desolation of the characters. As well as it was written, I was be glad to finish this and put it behind me. My emotions needed to settle down a bit.
It's too bad this is the last parable book. It's such a unique concept and a really interesting philosophy.
