“Lilith’s Brood contains three novels: Dawn, Adulthood Rites, and Imago. This trilogy tells the story of humanity after they’ve almost be all destroyed in a nuclear war and the development of a partial human, partial alien species.
A small group of survivors are rescued by a more powerful race called the Oankali. The Oankali travel through space in weird organic ships, trading genetic information with some of the people they meet. Having found the human species in this state, they decide to trade with them. The Oankali spend centuries healing the dying Earth and it is there when they merge with the few humans left, creating a new hybrid!
Despite the generic choice of the cover, this novel is actually not a romantic novel, though it does refer to sex and sexual related things often. A lot of the story is about the coming together of relationships. This is typically in terms of the bigger societal structure and the emotional (as well as chemical as we later find out) relationship bonds.
Dawn, tells the story of Lilith Lyapo, a human who is awakened by the Oankali, after the war that destroyed human civilization. The Oankali wants Lilith to teach the other humans and somehow tell them that their only way of surviving is by interbreeding.
Lilith has to find a way of coping with not being wanted and the inner problem of betraying self - a peaceful coexistence doesn’t seem to come easy. The aliens understand the biology of humanity, but can’t really understand their psychology.
Really a history book - races not understanding one another due to their cultural and genetic differences!
Adulthood Rites follows the story of Akin, Lilith’s hybrid Oankali-Human son. He’s the only male hybrid born to a human woman. He finds himself lost in between the two worlds and although very intelligent, finds it hard to be part of one or the other. A new perspective on the situations and maybe the most objective one of all three.
Imago, tells the story of Akin’s child Jodahs, the first hybrid Human-Oankali ooloi. This makes Jodahs a pure Oankali, giving us a new perspective on the situation.
Lilith’s Brood beautifully talks about a very complex social situation that we have seen over and over again every time a nation takes over and moves into the land of another nation, i.e Britain and India, US and Iraq/Afghanistan and so on. I loved the development of the Oankali aliens and how the misunderstandings and differences between the two species created the conflicts of the story.
No comments:
Post a Comment