Customer Reviews

Dawn

5 star:		(40)
4 star:		(15)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book is an extraordinary accomplishment, combining mind-blowing science fiction concepts with a very personal perspective.

It's several hundred years in the future. Human civilization has been all but destroyed through vaguely described but clearly self-inflicted wounds. Aliens have arrived with the goal of restoring human civilization as part of their drive to trade genetic and other information with other species. They've snatched a bunch of humans and effectively put them in storage until they can figure out what to do with them. Our main character, Lilith, is one of the first to be awakened as the aliens start to put their scheme into place. She must deal with the (initially terrifying) aliens at first, then, as she's selected as one of the leaders of the restoration, deal with her fellow revived humans as they are awakened as part of what's to be the first colony on the restored earth.

Though the initial conceit is remarkable, Butler focuses on Lilith's reactions to her situation, giving the story a remarkably personal, down-to-home feel despite the extraordinary occurrences. And there are no simple solutions. The aliens are doing good in restoring humanity but also have their own agenda, involving significant genetic manipulations of the restored humans. Lilith has misgivings about this which she much try to conceal while she awaits an opportunity to escape from their control. She must also deal with the similar concerns of her fellow humans without giving too much away.

All that being said, despite my admiration I somehow didn't find the book as gripping a read as one might think from the description. I'm definitely interested in reading the rest of the books in the series, but without the sort of urgency a devoted reader comes to expect when he or she makes a new "find." Still, I am impressed by the book and perhaps the series will grow on me.

Octavia Butler recently died in Seattle. Her passing is a great loss to literature in general and science fiction in particular. She once said that she didn't really write `Science Fiction' as such because she did know much about science. In fact her books do tackle some of the big themes of SciFi, but are not in the `hard science' genre. Her themes were race, sexuality, and the nature of `reality.'

Ms Butler was dyslexic, gay, above average in height, African American, and a genius. She lived as a hermit in the middle of a major city and created a body of work which stands with the very best. She won both Hugo and Nebula Awards several times and the MacArthur Foundation `Genius' Award in 1995. I think she is one of the few SciFi writers to have received this recognition.

I am posting this review on each of the Xenogenesis Trilogy (Dawn, Adulthood Rites, and Imago) sites as well as the volume where they are collected; `Lilith's Brood.' All are excellent and recommended.

In this series Ms Butler took on sexuality and the nature of `humanity' in a startling new way. She gradually takes the reader from the perspective of a `human,' specifically an Earthling who encounters an alien race to the perspective of the `alien,' specifically the descendent of interbreeding between humans and aliens who is now the `human' and sees Earthlings as the aliens.

Ms Butler skills are so great that this change in perspective goes so slowly that the reader is largely unaware until it has been accomplished. While some will dither about which of Ms Butler's novels are her `greatest,' few will argue that this series is superb. I have read nearly all of Ms Butler's works and enjoyed them all. I think she was one of the finest writers of speculative fiction in recent history and will miss her work.

After being assigned this novel for a college class, I picked it up expecting not to like it much; the professor had praised it as being exemplary of 'African-American writing,' a phrase I am as leery of as I am of 'feminist writing' or 'Asian writing' or any writing at all that's judged/labelled on the basis of the author's ethnic background or gender rather than on the merits of the story.

However, _Dawn_ was nothing like what I had feared. Its story does not seem aimed particularly at any target audience, instead being simply enjoyable science fiction. There is no preaching in this book--only an engaging plot which draws the reader into its folds, the better to sink tendrils into the mind and make one wonder 'What if...?' I don't know whether I *like* the ideas that Butler presents. They disturbed me. Yet I also found myself intrigued; there is plenty of food for thought in Lilith's relationship to the Oankali, and the Oankali's view of humanity.

It's a shame that the general portrayal of humanity is tainted enough to cost the book a star. True, the thought-provoking nature of the novel is in part due to the subtle questions it raises about conformity and the truth of the saying about what to do 'when rape is inevitable'--but with the exception of Lilith, we are given no human protagonists with whom we can strongly identify, through whose eyes we can really explore these issues. The males in particularly are portrayed poorly; for the most part violent, boorish, and sex-obsessed, they aren't what I would call the best representitives of our population. Nor are the woman any better; most of them are either followers or conformists, allowing themselves to be drugged and subjected to sexual activities that they would not consent to of their free will. These people aren't quite my idea of heroes or heroines.

All in all, though, this is a novel well-worth reading both for the questions it raises and for the entertaining story it provides. And for those who find themselves drawn in particularly strongly, the sequel, _Adulthood Rites_, will serve to clarify and expand on the ideas found here.

Take a few (formerly) cliched SF elements - a post-apocalyptic earth; alien abductions; humans repopulating the planet. Now, shake them up and filter them through Butler's prose, and you have a wonderful new animal (which would make the DNA-magician alien characters in this book proud)! The setting is nothing you've seen before, a whole new level in organic technology. The aliens are repugnant and compelling at the same time - not just because Butler says they are, but because through her words we feel the "alienness" of them. The humans are as fully-fleshed out as any in the best contemporary literature. The relationship between them is enormously complex, both physically and psychologically, and is the driving force in the story. The main character, Lilith, is a strong, African-American woman; if Alice Walker wrote science fiction, Lilith would be in that world. This is the first novel by Butler I've read. I'm glad it's the first of three in this series - now I know exactly what to pick up next.

Octavia Butler is a strange sort of author; try to explain the gist of her work to a new reader and you come off sounding foolish:" There's this woman who's been abducted by aliens with tentacle faces, except now she's supposed to repopulate Earth with the few remaining humans left after we've blown everything up in WWIII..." It sounds like atypical SF schlock... but Butler's honest dialogue and her knack for staying four to five steps ahead of the reader insure an astounding reading experience. Inevitably, when I read a book of Butler's, I spend the first sitting getting acclimated to the plot... the next sitting is a frenzied stopless race to the finish... Four novels equal four sleepless nights. I'm VERY excited to hear that DAWN is the first book in a series and I look forward to reading the rest as soon as possible... for those who haven't tried the Patternist stuff, look that way.

A short, enthralling, beautifully painless read. The author really knows how to tell her story, which is fascinating and new. Characters and plot are detailed, interesting and realistic. Human and alien characters (the Oankali) alike are very lifelike. The ideas behind the aliens are very fun and interesting : a species that can remix its own DNA, has three sexes and that acts as an interstellar DNA trader. A lot of thought went into creating the Oankali culture and biology. The pace of the book is brisk, details are given in the perfect amount, no overlong, self gratifying (for the author) descriptions... Octavia Butler has a thoroughly enjoyable writing style. I highly reccomend this book to any who cared enough to read these words. :)

This Xenogenesis series is reminiscent of Stranger in a Strange Land. And Octavia Butler is a writer of the same calibur as Robert Heinlein. Her writing is complex, fully fleshed out and engrossing. I cared about the characters, was sometimes disturbed by the story, and completely sucked into her world. I read this Trilogy in a couple of days. Excellent!

Dawn, Adulthood Rites & Imago (collected in the omnibus book Lilith's Brood).

"Dawn" was my first experience in Science Fiction. I couldn't believe I waited so long! I inhaled all three of the Xenogenesis books and am now reading her short stories, "Blood Child." The biotech stuff really intrigued me, especially since I work at an immunology research laboratory! Cancer and genetic diseases play a very important part in Ms. Butler's work.

I find the race issue to be secondary in her work and that her feministic approach to life is much more in the forefront. Either way, of course, being the subjugated being in one's world produces a certain world view - where one sits determines where one stands - something I can definitely relate to!

Between the medical, gender, racial, human and moral issues brought out by the wonderful story-telling, there is an enormous amount to think about.

This is a good book, well written with an extemely interesting premise--advanced (and very alien) aliens come to earth after a nuclear war and "save" mankind but turning humans into something else. The aliens call this a trade, a trade of genetic material in which each the two parties become something neither was before. The humans aren't thrilled with the idea and there lies the conflict. This is all well and good and certainly original and interesting but the humans in Butler's story seem too self destructive, too violent, and too unreasonable. At times Butler's aliens seem more realistic and more diverse than her human charcters. Still, it is both startling and thought provoking. And certainly worth reading. Just don't expect it to be perfect.

Even on the surface, it's a outstanding bit of soft SF, the kind about people dealing with technology, not the nuts and bolts themselves. Lilith finds awakens to find herself in a strange prison - but awakening at all is surprise enough, after a few madmen have scorched the Earth with nuclear war and left it to freeze in the dark of a nuclear winter. The saviors, the benign but alien Oankali, spend centuries rehabilitating the earth and the people they saved - but for a price. The Onakali are driven by species-wide imperatives of their own, and they never asked the people they saved whether they were willing to pay that price.

It's a good plot, worked in a beautifully literate way. Still, that's just the point of entry into may other facets of Butler's story-telling. Lilith, the mythical Other Eve, is pressed (or seduced) into duty as mother-leader for the people to be returned to the new Eden that the Oankali are making of Earth, so the myth is retold in more modern terms. And, as you may guess, Cain slays Abel again, before even reaching the garden. Then there's the question of freedom, specifically the freedom to go to hell in one's own way. Is is sane to expect gratitude from anyone denied that freedom? "Dawn" could also be a parable about biotech: both those who see, even need its potential for transformation, and those with reason to reject it. Both are right in some way, and both must coexist, as in our world, but the dynamics of power between them need to be understood. I do not believe Butler proposes this as the right answer. This can also be read as a black American woman's new telling of a people uprooted and made into something they never dreamed in their darkest nightmares. That just seems too glib, and unfairly slots Butler and her work as 'just another [fill in the blank]'. This unique writing deserves much more than that kind of generic brush-off.

This, like Butler's other writing, is gentle (but not to gentle) and thought-provoking. I recommend it highly.

//wiredwierd