Parable of the Sower

In a dystopian not-so-far future, a young woman tries to build a community and a religion amidst the violence, poverty and desperation. It is speculative fiction in its most unsubtle form, exploring our own society through an adventure-driven plot (and, be warned, LOADS of violence). It's social commentary is a bit on-the-nose. Compared to other works by Butler I read, I didn't think it was as skillful (Bloodchild) or original (Kindred). But if you take the book for what it is, you can immerse yourself in the story, appreciate the fact that for once the default identity of characters is not white and male, and feel even more pessimistic about the turn our world is taking.

maybe I was expecting too much because I'd heard about it in adrienne maree brown and Autumn Brown's podcast and thought this was going to be extremely mind-blowing. I kept expecting the story to go somewhere, to develop in some direction but it just kept being a bleak, lost earth and people trying to just survive on it. seemed to me like the plot just fizzled out.

If you have the stomach to read a book about how to survive an apocalypse right now, this is a banger. As created literary religions go, Earthseed is better than most, and Lauren Olamina is just such a well-written, thoughtful character.

Me deja un poco frío la idea de religión como sustituto del resto de las instituciones sociales en un tiempo apocalíptico, y no acabo de ver qué papel juega la hiperempatía en todo esto, si es mero atrezzo o un elemento verdaderamene importante. Lo veremos en el volumen dos.

Desde luego es un terreno de juego completamente diferente del de Xenogénesis.

On a second read, I feel a lot differently than I did the first time around. I can't separate uncomfortable feelings of reading about a teenager basically starting a cult and attracting people who are at their absolute most vulnerable to join. It doesn't sit well with me to read about Lauren's glee to "raise babies in Earthseed." And the intense, intense, dehumanization and otherizing of people using drugs, making them into physically unrecognizable monsters, is something I can't get past. If Lauren has hyper-empathy, and is more sensitive to people in need of help, then why does the buck stop with people using drugs?