Thank you again to the organisers of the Banned Book Club on BlueSky for prompting me to read this modern classic of dystopian fiction, Parable of the Sower by Octavia E Butler. I listened to the audio book read by Lynne Thigpen, which meant I couldn’t highlight quotes but it did really bring it alive.

In diary entries starting from 2024, teenager Lauren details what it takes to survive in an alternate California. The US is increasingly unstable between severe climate change; escalating privatisation of resources and services; and a scary drug that gives users a high from watching fire burn. Lauren lives in a gated community with her Black preacher father, Hispanic stepmother and gaggle of stepbrothers.

A gated community sounds fancy, but this is just an ordinary neighbourhood on the outskirts of LA of people who are at best lower middle class. They have had to put up walls, rigged alarms, set up 24-hour watches. They seem at first to be managing well. Several families grow some food in their gardens; one family breeds rabbits for food; most families have one person with a paying job. They trade between themselves, the teenagers date each other, the parents take turns teaching essential life skills to the children.

But they are under constant threat of robbery, violence, fire. When they leave the neighbourhood for weekly shooting practice they must keep constant watch for attacks from humans and feral dogs.

Added to this, Lauren has hyper empathy, literally feeling the pain and ecstasy of any people near her. Which is not helpful when surrounded by violence. She knows that worse times are coming and tries to encourage friends to prepare but they reject her warnings. All she can do is prepare herself.

In the background of these early months is a presidential election campaign where the frontrunner is anti-immigrant, “pro business” and generally pretty Trump-sounding, which seems weirdly prescient considering this novel was written in 1993. In fact, considering the state of the actual country right now, the whole novel feels like a warning of where the US could be headed.

Parable of the Sower is a frequently banned book and one of the questions posed in the BlueSky discussion was why we think it’s so frequently subject to bans. My answer was this: many (terrible) reasons. An invented religion. Saying slavery is bad. Depicting racial diversity and sex outside marriage. The hero is a Black teen girl and people listen to and follow her. Showing why privatisation of resources like water is bad. Depicting police as useless/criminal. Each element is a scarily small step from our reality. Which for many of us is a wake-up call of how bad things could get. But I guess some (rich white supremacists) might see this novel as an attack on them personally

That might have contained a few spoilers, sorry. But let’s circle back to that invented religion. Lauren rejects her preacher father’s Christianity and forms her own ideas of who or what God is. She settles on the concept of Earthseed, religious concepts based on change, preparedness and humanism. It’s a little odd but it gives her something to focus on, a way to maintain hope.

Which otherwise this novel would be sorely lacking. It is gripping and brilliant and deeply dark. I will definitely read the sequel Parable of the Talents but I’m not in a rush to be back in that dark place.

Published 1993 by Four Walls Eight Windows.

Source: Libro.fm/Bookhaus