E-book, 287 pages
English language
Published Sept. 11, 2008 by Beacon Press.
The first science fiction written by a black woman, Kindred has become a cornerstone of black American literature. This combination of slave memoir, fantasy, and historical fiction is a novel of rich literary complexity. Having just celebrated her 26th birthday in 1976 California, Dana, an African-American woman, is suddenly and inexplicably wrenched through time into antebellum Maryland. After saving a drowning white boy there, she finds herself staring into the barrel of a shotgun and is transported back to the present just in time to save her life. During numerous such time-defying episodes with the same young man, she realizes the challenge she’s been given...
Reading sci-fi conditions you to accept premises (like unexplained time travel) and revel in the direct storytelling they open up - here a visceral slavery story with a range of conflicted sympathies put up against 1970s race and gender relations.
Excellent book. Read it carefully and think.
There's not really any “science” in this fiction, just a literary device whereby the Black protagonist keeps getting carried back to a slave plantation from modern times. (Not a criticism, just don’t expect SciFi, but do read it anyway).
This device allows the protagonist to see the situation through modern eyes.
Enslavement is shown at the high, horrifying level of what it is like to be enslaved or slaver as the white protagonist shows some sympathy as a youth but grows into his father's attitudes as he is prepared to take over the plantation.
But it is also shown at the more detailed levels of how the players are partly aware of their situations but also so immersed in them that their questioning is submerged much of the time.
I’m going to read it again soon.
There’s a readers’ guide in the last …
Excellent book. Read it carefully and think.
There's not really any “science” in this fiction, just a literary device whereby the Black protagonist keeps getting carried back to a slave plantation from modern times. (Not a criticism, just don’t expect SciFi, but do read it anyway).
This device allows the protagonist to see the situation through modern eyes.
Enslavement is shown at the high, horrifying level of what it is like to be enslaved or slaver as the white protagonist shows some sympathy as a youth but grows into his father's attitudes as he is prepared to take over the plantation.
But it is also shown at the more detailed levels of how the players are partly aware of their situations but also so immersed in them that their questioning is submerged much of the time.
I’m going to read it again soon.
There’s a readers’ guide in the last few pages but I didn’t think some retired white professor, specializing in SciFi, had anything whatsoever to add to reading the book itself.
It's a time travel book, and I have a soft spot for those. This one is no exception.
I feel like the language of any book I read rubs off on me, and that is a minus, since this book takes place among black people and southern Americans, and I don't like the sound or style of that language. Especially since I listened to it in an audio form. But it is what it is.
The characters and the events that take place among the characters are realistic and kind of heartbreaking, yet exuding strength and hopefulness. It is a bit on the dark and violent side, but I don't feel bad after reading it.
Amazing. When someone asks me for a starter Sci-fi recommendation for now on, I think I'll start with this.
This is a rough read, but a good one. A sci-fi premise worked into a story that is more historical fiction/social commentary at its core. While there's some mechanical overlap between this and a story like The Time Traveler's wife, they're very different stories.
I'm pretty much in line with Christy's review here :).
Irgendwie war bei mir aus dem Studium oder wer weiß woher der Eindruck hängengeblieben, Octavia Butler sei langweilige Gendertheorie-Pflichtlektüre, vermutlich eine fatale Verwechslung mit Judith Butler (ohne behaupten zu wollen, die sei langweilig, weil: nie gelesen, womöglich ebenfalls ein Irrtum). Jedenfalls war dieses Buch überhaupt nicht langweilig, es hat Handlung (Zeitreisen! Sklaverei!) UND Figuren, die jeweils mehr als eine eindeutige Eigenschaft haben, eine seltene Kombination.
Not what I expected at all, but so good. Kindred ties Black History together and even after 40 years doesn't feel old or outdated. I'm not sure what it says about American history and present, but it definitely makes Octavia E. Butler a fantastic author.
I felt super anxious for Dana throughout, knowing the risks for her. At one point early on Kevin says that it doesn't seem that bad, and I must admit I felt the same at that time in the story. Of course Kevin is a white man which lends him a lot of privilege and Dana challenges him. It doesn't take long for the violence to escalate and for Dana to see the reality of her removal of rights.
It also shows how through fear, someone can become a compliant slave. Many wonder why slaves didn't band together to overthrow their captors, and Kindred tries to show why that might be. The master uses children as bargaining chips, the love of others to keep slaves in their place. And once Dana has experienced the pain and humiliation of a whipping, she is much more cautious about her actions.
She's also in …
I felt super anxious for Dana throughout, knowing the risks for her. At one point early on Kevin says that it doesn't seem that bad, and I must admit I felt the same at that time in the story. Of course Kevin is a white man which lends him a lot of privilege and Dana challenges him. It doesn't take long for the violence to escalate and for Dana to see the reality of her removal of rights.
It also shows how through fear, someone can become a compliant slave. Many wonder why slaves didn't band together to overthrow their captors, and Kindred tries to show why that might be. The master uses children as bargaining chips, the love of others to keep slaves in their place. And once Dana has experienced the pain and humiliation of a whipping, she is much more cautious about her actions.
She's also in the awkward position of needing to protect Rufus or be erased from existence. She has to basically endorse rape in order to exist. It's difficult to read in places.
It doesn't really tackle any of the paradoxes of time travel, and there are no implications of the modern day items she takes back with her. I felt her a very sensible woman to take some of the things she did. You just kind of have to accept what happens, happens.
I would recommend Kindred. I didn't really feel engaged by the first third or so, but found myself unable to stop after a while.
Seems odd to say I enjoyed it, but I did really appreciate it. I appreciate how the relationships between characters, with the institutions of slavery, farming, with their time and place, are complicated.
Not that they're difficult to understand or full of twists and changes—though they can be—but that the author managed to build them up in a way that made sense, but also looked all wrong when I looked up from the book and thought about it. Reading it was a process of acknowledging some unspoken assumptions of mine that showed me how simple or weakly-considered my own understanding of slavery and social structures of the time may be.
Well that was harrowing.
Has the same incisive human understanding as Parable of the Sower, but with the added grimness of historical accuracy. Still a bit didactic.
Jesus, this book was a rough read. Not because it was poorly written; it wasn't. Not because I couldn't engage with it; I most certainly could. It was rough because the topic came so fiercely alive in Octavia Butler's words, and because it left me feeling obscurely guilty, not because I'd done anything like those awful things Rufus and the other whites did, but because I felt a sort of guilt by association. As if what these white slaveholders did was a responsibility I myself needed to discharge. And you know what? I'm okay with that.
The events in this book might be fictional, but they were hardly invented from whole cloth. Slavery happened, and it was assuredly both more brutal and more insidious than many of us today can reasonably imagine. The effects of that shameful period of our history are still felt today, and I'm as culpable in …
Jesus, this book was a rough read. Not because it was poorly written; it wasn't. Not because I couldn't engage with it; I most certainly could. It was rough because the topic came so fiercely alive in Octavia Butler's words, and because it left me feeling obscurely guilty, not because I'd done anything like those awful things Rufus and the other whites did, but because I felt a sort of guilt by association. As if what these white slaveholders did was a responsibility I myself needed to discharge. And you know what? I'm okay with that.
The events in this book might be fictional, but they were hardly invented from whole cloth. Slavery happened, and it was assuredly both more brutal and more insidious than many of us today can reasonably imagine. The effects of that shameful period of our history are still felt today, and I'm as culpable in repairing this damage as any other white person.
This book resonated with me, and I'll be buying a physical copy as soon as possible.
A black author in the 1970s finds herself sent to the time of slavery, with her fate tied to that of a young slave owner. The book was powerful because of the subject matter, but I didn't find it especially gripping in terms of storyline or character development.
This is about the fourth time I've read it. It's also about the third time I've bought it; the first time I read it in the library, and the other two times I ended up giving the book away, once to a young woman who worked in a local coffee shop and who was fascinated by my description of it. It's not only an exploration of the horror of slavery, but of its psychology and the effects that it had on both the slaves and the slaver owners. A masterpiece.
Couldn't put it down this weekend. Very good read - some painful stuff to endure, but good characters and plot pacing.
