![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/ParableOfTheTalents.jpg?resize=328%2C499&ssl=1\")
Book 2, Earthseed Novels\nBy Octavia Butler
\nOpen Road Integrated Media, Inc., ISBN: 978-1-4532-6543-7
\nPaperback, 320 pages. \u00a9 2012
\n(Originally published 1998)\n
<\/p>Book 2, Earthseed Novels
\nBy Octavia Butler
\nOpen Road Integrated Media, Inc., ISBN: 978-1-4532-6543-7
\nPaperback, 320 pages. \u00a9 2012
\n(Originally published 1998)\n
In 2032, Lauren lives with her husband Bankole, their infant daughter Larkin, and the rest of the Earthseed community on an isolated piece of land they\u2019ve named Acorn. They support one another, care for each other, set up watches for the inevitable would-be thieves and murderers from Outside who will steal or kill to survive. They\u2019ve hidden caches of food, documents, money, medicines all around their land. And they\u2019re doing a fine business with Bankole\u2019s medical training, Acorn\u2019s garden produce, and the many tinkering talents they\u2019ve accumulated among their members. Life is good, and those who live on the land at Acorn feel blessed.<\/p>\n
But when the new president is elected, promising to \u201cmake America great again,\u201d his crusaders spread out among the \u201cheathen, non-Christian witches,\u201d arresting people for vagrancy, for teaching or believing anything other than Christian American theologies, or for being in possession of something they themselves could use. Acorn, isolated as it is, draws these vultures like roadkill and none of their lives will ever be the same.<\/p>\n
Parable of the Talents picks up where Parable of the Sower left off, more or less, but is \u201cnarrated\u201d by Larkin, who is grown and looking back over her mother\u2019s life. Events are revealed in journal entries, as they were in Sower, but this time it isn\u2019t only Lauren\u2019s words we see. Larkin, Bankole, and a surprise callback from Sower (no spoilers!) tell us of their lives after the birth of Acorn. Each journal entry\u2019s voice is unique, colored by the individual writer\u2019s experience and perspective, all viewing Lauren\u2019s life\u2014and her decisions\u2014through their own filters. Not all the characters in Lauren\u2019s journey see her as she saw herself, and I think that is one of the details I liked best about Talents. We are each heroes in our own story, even when we are villains in someone else\u2019s. Butler made this distinction in a way that shines.<\/p>\n
There is an old quote attributed to Nietzsche which says \u201cThat which does not kill me makes me stronger.\u201d Lauren Oya Olamina is the embodiment of this bit of wisdom, and while she did not see herself as a hero, she consistently and unflinchingly does whatever she thinks is necessary to fulfill a Destiny for her people. Once again entrenched in a classic Hero\u2019s Quest, she must learn to not only keep herself alive, but her people as well. This time, however, the stakes are twisted. Sometimes, death is not the worst that can happen. And sometimes, scars run too deep to ever completely heal.<\/p>\n
Talents is a frightening, dystopian tale, one that surpasses even Parable of the Sower in its prophetic, plausible intensity. There were times, reading Talents, that I felt physically sickened by the events unfolding on the page. At least twice, it was all I could do to keep reading\u2014not because the story wasn\u2019t good, but because it was so horrifically believable. I could easily see these events taking place in our own time, our own world. Climate issues continue to be part of the setting\u2019s challenges, but in this second book of the Earthseed story, it is human extremism that darkens the pages. Butler is not twisting reality, I think, to show us this worst face of humanity. We already see tendencies toward this mindset in modern-day American news and politics. It wouldn\u2019t take much to open the gates on the sort of hate and power-mongering Butler depicts in Talents. That is, for me, what made it such a difficult read.<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t think you could pick up Parable of the Talents and understand it without having first read Parable of the Sower. And I don\u2019t believe you could read both books and come away unchanged. Butler has pulled back the curtain on where we are headed, and shown us one of many ugly futures we could face if we don\u2019t change directions. The Earthseed novels are essential reading for anyone living in this era.<\/p>\n<\/body>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Book 2, Earthseed Novels By Octavia Butler Open Road Integrated Media, Inc., ISBN: 978-1-4532-6543-7 Paperback, 320 pages. \u00a9 2012 (Originally published 1998) In 2032, Lauren lives with her husband Bankole, their infant daughter Larkin, and the rest of the Earthseed community on an isolated piece of land they\u2019ve named Acorn. They support one another, care…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1620,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1640","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-reviews"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/ParableOfTheTalents.jpg?fit=328%2C499&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8n0kX-qs","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":192,"url":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/2017\/05\/08\/the-queen-of-blood-book-one-of-the-queens-of-renthia\/","url_meta":{"origin":1640,"position":0},"title":"The Queen of Blood: Book One of the Queens of Renthia","author":"DremaDeoraich","date":"May 8, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"by Sarah Beth Durst HarperCollins Publishers, L.L.C. \u00a9 2016 ISBN 978-0-06-241334-5 Print length 368 pages, $19.99 Renthia\u2019s spirits want to create, according to their nature. 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