Bloodchild

by

eBook, 31 pages

English language

Published Jan. 6, 1996

View on OpenLibrary

5 stars (2 reviews)

Set on a distant planet, Bloodchild is award-winning author Octavia E. Butler's shattering meditation on symbiosis, love, power and tough choices. It won the Hugo, Locus, Nebula and Science Fiction Chronicle awards and is widely regarded as one of her greatest works. Perfect for fans of the thrilling Arrival and the works of Ursula Le Guin.

'Years ago, a group known as the Terrans left Earth in search of a life free of persecution. Now they live alongside the Tlic, an alien race who face extinction; their only chance of survival is to plant their larvae inside the bodies of the humans.

When Gan, a young, boy, is chosen as a carrier of Tlic eggs, he faces an impossible dilemma: can he really help the species he has grown up with, even if it means sacrificing his own life?

1 edition

reviewed Bloodchild by Octavia E. Butler

Brilliant short story

5 stars

The short story, Bloodchild, is the first I have read of Octavia Butler's writing and I sincerely hope it won't be the last. Olivia (of Olivia's Catastrophe) is right. Octavia Butler is an amazing storyteller! I spotted Bloodchild free on Amazon so snapped up the download and would recommend every other reader to do the same. At just thirty pages, Butler gives us enough of the alien essentials of her imagined world that I was able to understand exactly what was taking place. The Terran humans being the subjugated species and seen as little more than animals to the Tlic is especially relevant to me at the moment because it's Veganuary so the idea got me thinking about how different attitudes would be if humans weren't such a dominant species here on earth.

Subjects

  • Science fiction