Parable of the talents

365 pages

English language

Published 1998 by Seven Stories Press.

OCLC Number:: 39478160

Parable of the Talents celebrates the usual Butlerian themes of alienation and transcendence, violence and spirituality, slavery and freedom, and separation and community, to astonishing effect in the shockingly familiar, broken world of 2032.

A continuation of the travails of Lauren Olamina, the heroine of 1994 Nebula Award finalist Parable of the Sower, Parable of the Talents is told in the voice of Lauren Olamina's daughter Larkin, also called Asha Vere - from whom she has been separated for most of the girl's life - with sections in the form of Lauren's journal.

Against a background of a war-torn continent, and with a far-right religious crusader in the office of the U.S. presidency, this is a book about a society whose very fabric has been torn asunder. And yet human life, oddly, thrives in this unforgettable novel. And the young Lauren of Parable of the Sower here blossoms …

Parable of the Talents celebrates the usual Butlerian themes of alienation and transcendence, violence and spirituality, slavery and freedom, and separation and community, to astonishing effect in the shockingly familiar, broken world of 2032.

A continuation of the travails of Lauren Olamina, the heroine of 1994 Nebula Award finalist Parable of the Sower, Parable of the Talents is told in the voice of Lauren Olamina's daughter Larkin, also called Asha Vere - from whom she has been separated for most of the girl's life - with sections in the form of Lauren's journal.

Against a background of a war-torn continent, and with a far-right religious crusader in the office of the U.S. presidency, this is a book about a society whose very fabric has been torn asunder. And yet human life, oddly, thrives in this unforgettable novel. And the young Lauren of Parable of the Sower here blossoms into the full strength of her womanhood, complex and entirely credible.

19 editions

C. Pimentel reviewed La parábola de los talentos by Octavia E. Butler

Una buena segunda parte

4 stars

Me ha gustado mucho, como el primero. Se me sigue atragantando un poco la parte religiosa, pero no desmerece el resto del libro. A mitad del libro tuve que aparcarlo unos días, porque ocurren unas cosas que... Aunque es una trilogía inconclusa, el libro queda bien cerrado y deja la historia terminada.

benwerd@bookwyrm.social reviewed Parable of the Talents by Octavia E. Butler (Earthseed #2, #2)

All that you touch, you change

5 stars

I fought my way through Parable of the Talents, not because it isn’t masterful - it is - but because Octavia Butler’s writing unflinchingly covers ideas and traumas that have become more relevant in the time since its publication. Butler was a soothsayer, unfortunately able to accurately predict the future based on the treatment of people in her present. It’s a harrowing read with obvious parallels to our current right-wing context. But it wasn’t until the epilogue that it completely destroyed me. This is a human story at its heart, with living, breathing characters who love and yearn, sometimes messily. It’s real, for every definition of real. I fought my way through Parable of the Talents, not because it isn’t masterful - it is - but because Octavia Butler’s writing unflinchingly covers ideas and traumas that have become more relevant in the time since its publication. Butler was a soothsayer, …

I fought my way through Parable of the Talents, not because it isn’t masterful - it is - but because Octavia Butler’s writing unflinchingly covers ideas and traumas that have become more relevant in the time since its publication. Butler was a soothsayer, unfortunately able to accurately predict the future based on the treatment of people in her present. It’s a harrowing read with obvious parallels to our current right-wing context. But it wasn’t until the epilogue that it completely destroyed me. This is a human story at its heart, with living, breathing characters who love and yearn, sometimes messily. It’s real, for every definition of real. I fought my way through Parable of the Talents, not because it isn’t masterful - it is - but because Octavia Butler’s writing unflinchingly covers ideas and traumas that have become more relevant in the time since its publication. Butler was a soothsayer, unfortunately able to accurately predict the future based on the treatment of people in her present. It’s a harrowing read with obvious parallels to our current right-wing context. But it wasn’t until the epilogue that it completely destroyed me. This is a human story at its heart, with living, breathing characters who love and yearn, sometimes messily. It’s real, for every definition of real.

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Young women -- Fiction
Twenty-first century -- Fiction

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