Fledgling

The potential for the universe that was built in this book was amazing, but it took so many wrong turns for me. The largest one being that I couldn't over come the instinctual "ick" of the little girl MC having sexual relations with so many people at once. I also wasn't very intrigued by the mystery, and therefor didn't care much once it was revealed. The characters fell flat for me as well. In general, I found this book very disappointing.

I admit that I wanted to like this more than I did simply because I am a big fan of Kindred. I was slightly ambivalent about another book on vampires, however, and while I tried not to take that into serious account when reading Butler, it still crept in. Mostly, however, I liked the book fine. Any m......more

What do vampires want most, Octavia Butler was asked by her friend. To suck blood? No, her friend replied, to walk in sunlight. Fledgling by Octavia Butler provides a solution for these vampiric woes, inspired by her friend’s question and written during an escape from the grit and darkness she had t......more

Vampires! Sci-fi vampires! Octavia Butler! While I love Octavia Butler, I have been avoiding Fledgling for a while because Twilight* and the “paranormal romance” genre that followed in its wake are anathema to me. I knew of course that Ms. Butler would never slum it with Stephenie Meyer, but the sub......more

3.5 – 4 stars Another vampire book review from the guy who says he’s not a fan of vampires? Yeah, well I’m trying to find the good ones, not the dreck that’s jumped onto the Twilight bandwagon. And quite frankly I didn’t pick this one up because it was a vampire book per se, but because it was one b......more

Sometimes things are not what they seem. That is the unspoken theme of Octavia Butler’s Fledgling novel. I don't recall Butler ever stating this theme outloud but she does confront us with one example after another. Butler is not afraid of making us feel uncomfortable in the process. If you are in n......more