The complete series about an alien species that could save humanity after nuclear apocalypse—or destroy it—from “one of science fiction’s finest writers” (The New York Times). The newest stage in human evolution begins in outer space. Survivors of a cataclysmic nuclear war awake to find themselves being studied by the Oankali, tentacle-covered galactic travelers whose benevolent appearance hides … benevolent appearance hides their surprising plan for the future of mankind. The Oankali arrive not just to save humanity, but to bond with it—crossbreeding to form a hybrid species that can survive in the place of its human forebears, who were so intent on self-destruction. Some people resist, forming pocket communities of purebred rebellion, but many realize they have no choice. The human species inevitably expands into something stranger, stronger, and undeniably alien. From Hugo and Nebula award–winning author Octavia Butler, Lilith’s Brood is both a thrilling, epic adventure of man’s struggle to survive after Earth’s destruction, and a provocative meditation on what it means to be human.
This ebook features an illustrated biography of Octavia E. Butler including rare images from the author’s estate.
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Outstanding science fiction that is also a study of human nature and a critique of our ‘fatal flaw’ as both hierarchical and intelligent creatures hell-bent on self destruction.
A one of a kind read by a one of a kind author. It’s sad she passed away young…I’ll bet there were more haunting tales swirling around in her imagination!
Truly unique look at the ‘what if’ of our planet and evolution. Compelling alien characters and great insight into human beings and our flaws. very satisfying science fiction.
Genius.
addicted to it!
Lots of action, suspense, but most of all the lovemaking scenes…. Wow!
This is the last book in the series, read the others in order.
Amazing!
Very imaginative and well worth reading! Interesting view of the future. I loved these books and often think of them years later.
Octavia Butler is an accomplished storyteller whose characters are authentic and relatable. Her work is original and thought-provoking. Untangling the balance between right and wrong, good and evil, in ways that provoke thought and reflection. I love her works.
Really loved this 3-book series. Interesting characters, with an unpredictable and intriguing plot. Good SF.
My all time favorite sci-fi. I re-read it every few years. Changed the way I think about the future.
One of the best books I’ve read in years. I was already a fan of Octavia Butlers, but this reminded me why; her stories are way more than a good read, which is one was. Lilith’s Brood takes you through history and in a really personal, compelling way.
Imaginative, thought-provoking, couldn’t put it down.
Very imaginative story. Great writing.
Good read. I like Butler’s quirky main characters and her books written from their point of view.
I have been reading science fiction and fantasy (SF&F) for over 50 years. I was a professional (paid) reviewer for the Greensburg, PA Tribune-Review for ten years. In all my years of reading, Octavia Butler’s Xenogenesis Trilogy (which is how this trio was originally marketed) is the most creative, imaginative science fiction trilogy I have read. Butler is a winner of a Genius Grant from, I think, the Ford Foundation. Her work is head and shoulders above that of the majority of SF&F writers. I highly recommend this work to any reader of serious SF. This is a book that you cannot just “dash” through. It is a deep and deeply thoughtful book. Highly recommended.
If I was breaking it down by book I’d give Dawn 4 stars, Adulthood Rites 3 stars, and Imago 2.5 stars (I feel like there’s a big difference between 2 and 3 stars, hence the half star).
Starting with non-spoiler comments for each book and then I’ll label the stuff with spoilers.
Dawn- It’s definitely well written and I appreciated that it had a message to it and was written with ethics in mind. There was lots of racial diversity. The ideas were pretty cool. I’m not sure I agree with her premise that humanity’s fundamental genetic flaw is that we’re both intelligent and hierarchical (I think the hierarchical thing is cultural rather than genetic) but I think it’s an interesting idea to play with. Some of her examination of gender was interesting although I don’t think it went as far as it could have gone- but maybe part of that is because it was written in the 80s. I’m also not a huge fan of how she uses “it” as the gender neutral pronoun rather than the singular “they,” but again, that’s probably just because it was written in the 80s. A bunch of characters were introduced via one character reading their dossiers and then it doesn’t revisit that information when the characters are actually present in the scene. This makes the character descriptions hard to remember and keep straight. I’d recommend bookmarking that scene when you come to it so you can refer back to it. The pacing was a bit slower than I would have liked, but it never got full-on tedious.
Adulthood Rites- There was a bit of an unbalanced feel with how the main character is a baby for half of it. Babies creep me out. I also found it kind of frustrating that the character’s maleness kept being a thing that makes him so special. These books do a great job of calling out male violence but it turns around and makes this male character so special and exceptional. That’s not to say I’m against good male characters of course, I’m just against the world revolving around them. Also, without giving away too many spoilers in this section, this book is all about examining a certain concept, which is great, but I think it failed to address a pretty huge alternate approach. Interesting examination of human nature although I don’t think I agree with it.
Imago- This was definitely my least favorite. It was well written and everything, but it doesn’t introduce any new philosophical ideas that weren’t already covered by the previous two novels. Sure, science fiction can be fun even if it isn’t dealing in philosophy or politics, but this book didn’t introduce any imaginative elements that weren’t in the previous books, and the plot wasn’t super exciting either, so it didn’t have anything of interest for me. I don’t even have any further comments for the spoiler section. It just wasn’t that interesting.
***THE REST OF THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS***
Dawn- Okay, so now I can mention that the aliens want to have sex with the humans in a sense. The plan is to take male/female pairs of humans and put them with the third gender alien Ooloi to make human/alien constructs. My first problem is that there were no gay or lesbian characters being bothered at being paired with an opposite-gender human. Plenty of humans were bothered at the sex with aliens thing of course, but none were bothered by the human they were paired with. There were enough human characters that it would be unlikely not to have gay or lesbian person among them.
And yeah, as other reviewers say, some of the alien sex seems pretty coerced. To be fair, the aliens do kind of have mind reading powers (not literally, but in a sense) so maybe in this fantasy scenario it’s reasonable to say that they can know that a particular spoken “no” doesn’t actually mean no. The Oankali are generally coercive and the main character is plainly aware of that throughout the book, so maybe we’re supposed to know it’s creepy but it has to be done given the circumstances. There are a couple attempted rapes by humans in other parts of the book that are clearly condemned. The situation is different enough from any real life human situations that I’m willing to give it the benefit of the doubt.
Adulthood Rites- The thing that bothered me the most was that every character wanted to have children. The characters in the Oankali settlement are happy with having as many children as possible and the characters in human settlements are universally upset that they’re infertile. This seemed extremely implausible to me. If I found out that I was suddenly painlessly sterilized I would be happy to never have to worry about birth control again because I strongly don’t want to have kids. I get that I’m in a minority here, but I don’t think I’m rare. There were probably plenty of women like me in the 80s, right?
I was also frustrated that no one considered the idea of voluntary extinction. It’s just assumed that humans by default want to repopulate. I’ve talked to a lot of people these days who think that, given climate change, it’s irresponsible to birth more humans into this environment. Maybe that wasn’t yet a popular view in the 80s, but I don’t think it was unheard of.