Customer Reviews

Childhood's End

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**SPOILER AHEAD!!**

Just finished "Childhoods End" ....all i can say is it's still sinking in. Love the way this first contact with aliens has trasnformed into an apocalypse to include god and a race that is tormented forever by not being able to join with that god ...a devil appearing race. Interesting how man is warned that there are only two evolutionary ends to go in the universe, the way of the overmind, a joining (with god) or an independent longing existence as with the devil appearing race. ....and somehow we have thought of these things with a memory of the future. Cool.

**SPOILERS**

What is love? What is true sacrifice for a greater good? What is our relationship to things greater than ourselves? Big questions, and this novel makes you think about them, feel them, in a profound way. An alien race forces man to unite, and question our place in the universe, and in the end forces us to question the meaning of love for our children, and the meaning of ultimate sacrifice. Man becomes a Christ figure to higher intelligence. I wasn't surprised to see C.S. Lewis praise this book, although it is not really religious, or meant to be any sort of Christian allegory. I've read 20 sci-fi books, and love PKD, but this one has true staying power. But it was also easy to read, and engrossing -- and in the end profound. A great sci-fi book for people who want to sample the genre.

'Childhood's End' has a reputation as one of the greatest science fiction novels ever written. And I'll admit the premise is compelling. But the book fails because Clarke does not create a single character worth caring about. Sure humanity is transformed, but the reader's emotions remain untouched.