Fledgling by Octavia Butler
The universe is a cruel, cruel place.
The first writer since Anne Rice (I know, I know, Rice has been a total hack since she fired her editor, but Interview and Lestat were awesome, come on) to do something new and interesting with the vampire myth (okay, pace Joss Whedon, but he didn't write novels), and she goes and dies without writing the CLEARLY NECESSARY sequel(s).
Still, don't let that keep you from reading this, because it is excellent. The basic idea of the story is that the protagonist is a vampire who can go out in daylight partly because she is black...but for a world-building freak like me the really cool part is all the details of the vampire society--they have a legal system and everything!
A new twist here is that the vampires don't just go out and feed on anybody--they have particular human symbiotes that they get their sustenance from. The relationship is more or less consensual, with some benefits for the humans, but there are also some unpleasant overtones of slavery, something that I think Butler was planning to address in later books. (WHICH WE WILL NEVER GET TO READ NOW! IT'S SO FREAKING SAD.)
I seriously haven't been this upset about an author's death since Douglas Adams died.
The first writer since Anne Rice (I know, I know, Rice has been a total hack since she fired her editor, but Interview and Lestat were awesome, come on) to do something new and interesting with the vampire myth (okay, pace Joss Whedon, but he didn't write novels), and she goes and dies without writing the CLEARLY NECESSARY sequel(s).
Still, don't let that keep you from reading this, because it is excellent. The basic idea of the story is that the protagonist is a vampire who can go out in daylight partly because she is black...but for a world-building freak like me the really cool part is all the details of the vampire society--they have a legal system and everything!
A new twist here is that the vampires don't just go out and feed on anybody--they have particular human symbiotes that they get their sustenance from. The relationship is more or less consensual, with some benefits for the humans, but there are also some unpleasant overtones of slavery, something that I think Butler was planning to address in later books. (WHICH WE WILL NEVER GET TO READ NOW! IT'S SO FREAKING SAD.)
I seriously haven't been this upset about an author's death since Douglas Adams died.
posted by Marian The at 9:31 PM
4 Comments:
ah, honey! i'm really excited to read this. I haven't started the willis book yet, and i just bought (for $1) brave new world. and i'm supposed to start reading the information freedom manual for a class in the Fall - i'm gonna try to do all the coursework this summer... :-) but this sounds really cool.
ah, honey! i'm really excited to read this. I haven't started the willis book yet, and i just bought (for $1) brave new world. and i'm supposed to start reading the information freedom manual for a class in the Fall - i'm gonna try to do all the coursework this summer... :-) but this sounds really cool.
i'm retarted and posted twice.
actually, this site is RETARDED because the button read "login and publish" so i thought it wouldn't go, since i thought it would prompt me for login credentials, and then i would have to select "anonymous" and "publish". It should read "login/publish" or by clicking on the radio button "Anonymous" it should change just to "publish". stupid site.
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