Book Review: Lilith's Brood

There are a couple reasons for two posts today. The first is that I wanted to talk to someone. The second is that I am sick in bed and not exactly wanting to interact, physically, with anyone. The third is that while sick in bed, I finished an incredible book that I have been reading for the past couple of weeks. The book, Lilith's Brood by Octavia Butler, is actually three books combined into one; Dawn, Adulthood Rites, and Imago. I guess the best way to talk about the story is to break it down into each of the smaller books.

Dawn. Humanity has just experienced its final war, the war to end all wars... and life on Earth. An alien species, the Oankali, manage to rescue a handful of survivors from the nuclear holocaust (incidentally, people tending to be in the southern hemisphere at the time) and sustain their life through suspended animation on a ship just outside the moon's orbit around the earth. The Oankali are known as 'traders', that is, through 'trading' some of their DNA with the DNA of an alien species, they produce offspring containing the best qualities of both. So obviously, the plan is to trade with humans. They choose the reluctant leader, Lilith, to awaken other humans, explain to them the nature of their rescue, and to train the humans to survive in the post-apocalyptic, newly revived earth. (New earth is somewhere in the Amazon. Humans are encouraged to live peaceful, raw vegan lifestyles. Yay!) Of course, there's a catch. While the Oankali corrected any genetic mutations and predispositions to disease--making the humans stronger and more resilient-- they also induced sterility among the humans. The only way for the Humans to procreate is by joining with the Oankali.

Adulthood Rites. The union between the Oankali and Humans of Lilith's family has produced the first Human-born male construct, Akin. Seen as a threat to both species, Human males would have the intense perceptions of the Oankali and the empathy for Human intelligence/hierarchical design known as the Human Contradiction. As an infant, Akin is kidnapped by Human resistors of the Oankali to be sold to a couple who chose the Oankali-induced sterility over interspecies procreation. He is separated from what would become his closest sibling (born a few months later) forcing a biochemical estrangement of the two. Living his most impressionable years away from his closest sibling an among human resistors, he understands their cause and wants to help. Years later, after his returning to his village, he is sent to the Oankali space ship with his estranged sibling in hopes of finding an ooloi (the 'third' Oankali gender that made procreation between the species possible, and who served as a medicine practitioner) who might help repair their relationship. While away, Akin also studies under an Oankali sage (of the 'old' kind) who did not participate in the previous DNA trade that produced the present Oankali race. If these Oankali could be exempt from the trade, then Humans who also did not want to participate should be given their own space (and their fertility) to recreate their own civilization, Akin argued to the Oankali. They just had to find a place to do it, and Human resistors willing to colonize the new space.

Imago. The Human-Oankali trade on Earth has produced its first Human-born ooloi construct--a creation believed to be so dangerous that Oankali consensus held that it must immediately be returned to the ship permanently. Or endure exile on earth. The Oankali believed that the new ooloi would have shape-shifting capabilities that would frighten and cause the Human resistors to react violently in response and it would not have the ability to control genetic modifications it induced in the plant and animal life it experienced. The family chose temporary exile until the new ooloi, Jodahs, could prove itself to not be a threat. Its same-sex parent, Nikanj (ooloi of Lilith's mating) trains and nurtures it through its first metamorphosis. Afterward, Jodahs experiences an incredible urge to find a mate and while wandering through the woods during his exile, finds two ideal Humans with a surprising secret. All the while, his closest sibling also reveals itself to be ooloi. In order for both ooloi siblings to survive, they must find mates, evade violent, armed Human resistors, and create an existence on earth for the new ooloi constructs.

End of synopsis. Alright, so I've actually never written a book review before. And it's pretty difficult to toe the line of summarizing the story while not giving too much away such that no one will want to read the book. Anyway, I really enjoyed it and definitely had dreams in which I was part of the new Human-Oankali society. If you read the book, I think you'll understand my fascination with the trade (I'm not particularly attached to my species anyway, which is not a bad thing) but also with the ooloi and what they could do for us if they were real. I love how the story was so much about the phenomenon of life itself, and I want to end this with the last few lines of the book, lines which I felt totally best summed up the tone.

"I chose a spot near the river. There I prepared the seed to go into the ground. I gave it a thick, nutritious coating, then brought it out of my body through my right sensory hand. I planted it deep in the rich soil of the riverbank. Secondsafter I had expelled it, I felt it begin the tiny positioning movements of independent life." -Lilith's Brood: Imago by Octavia Butler