Parable of the Sower | 
🌱 Yesterday I finished Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler. It was good so I will read the sequel, but not for awhile because it was kind of tough to get through mentally.
☑️ But…now I can check off another book from my Free Black Women‘s Library sweatshirt. When I got it a few years ago I had only read 2/7 of the authors and now I‘m up to 5/7.!
🩶 Also it‘s not just inspiration, it‘s one of my favorite hoodies!
Getting crazy on a Friday night! After a long week it‘s Parable of the Sower and a dog pile ftw.
#dogsoflitsy
I‘ve read this & its sequel a few years back and ever since I‘ve been telling everyone I know to read it. Especially if they are against the now current Administration in the US. The story feels eerily current but also strangely comforting in that unsettling familiarity? Hard to explain.
Hope everyone reading for #WithTheBanned enjoys. 💌
“Moral: The weak can overcome the strong if the weak persist. Persisting isn‘t always safe, but it‘s often necessary.”
#resist
#WiththeBanned
Hey #WithTheBanned readers! Sorry I‘ve fallen behind this month - work has been very busy.
I‘ll be posting 5 discussions questions total. I don‘t want to overwhelm y‘all with notifications, so I‘ll just tag everyone in the first post.
This seems particularly relevant right now.
#resist
#WiththeBanned
pickIt really is amazing how close to reality this book is. I‘ve read it before but I was glad to read it again with #WithTheBanned @Jadams89
pickA dystopian novel written in the early '90s. It is set in 2024 to 2027.. some of it is definitely possible. It was a little scary. I've yet to read the second book which is a follow-on. Thanks to those who recommended it.
Thanks for the tag @dabbe
#TLT #ThreeListThursday
Just too hard to only do 3 😂
Mrs. Dalloway
Portrait of an Artist As A Young Man
Parable Of The Sower
Moby-Dick
pickOof. Given the political landscape of the US right now, this book is like an all-too-possible nightmare. Probably not the best decision to listen to this in terms of my mental health and anxiety…. But it‘s really so well written. I may read the next book in the duology, but I‘m gonna need a minute.
Reminder that our #WithTheBanned read for February is Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler. I‘ll post our discussion questions for January‘s book in the next few days.
#BuddyRead
The LA fires, black Altadena and Octavia Butler. https://youtu.be/5tLYpq1aEBU?si=v8-kR17-KksX08cX
pickAmazing. Written in 1993, how did she know? There‘s no water in California, the lucky people still live in houses behind walls, everyone is armed to the teeth. Terrific.
Tackle the TBR 🤓📚
What are you reading?
#boleybooks #parableofthesower #octaviaebutler #bookbuds #bookchat #libby
pickPrescient and poignant, especially regarding corporate greed & climate change. This was my first Octavia Butler. The pace picked up for me as soon as Lauren leaves home (“a tree cannot grow in its parents‘ shadows”). There are some powerful lessons conveyed about community and the dynamic nature of gender. What I didn‘t find particularly dynamic, however, was the tone. For this reason, it won‘t ever become one of my favorites. Still, I respect it.
I despise working the late shift…but I can‘t be mad about slow mornings.
bailedThis book became too emotionally heavy to read in this world with everything I had going on personally. I'll pick it up again.
September, October and November for book club. #FirstSaturdayReaders #bookclub
Up next for book club. #FirstSaturdayReaders #BookClub
so-soWell, I‘ve finally read it. The writing is great, but it‘s difficult for me to say I enjoyed it given the subject matter and context I‘m reading it in now. Chaos, disorder, little respect for humanity, and idea of states having what amounts to national borders.
The so-so rating is only because speculative fiction isn‘t my bag and I am not intrigued enough to read the second novel. It‘s too bad Butler didn‘t live to write the third!
I'm finally reading Parable of the Sower and I had no idea the diary entries start in July 2024. It's an odd feeling to pick a book and see it starts around the day you started reading it 😅
Watching the Harris fundraiser in GA with my current read; such a prescient novel. Please let the seeds fall on fertile ground!
Show us what you are reading this weekend! Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler July 20, 2024…IYKYK. Love & Whisky by Fawn Weaver…history not being told. #weekendreads @rachelsbrittain
pickI heard on a podcast that this book, published in 1993, starts in July 2024. So I figured I‘d give it a try. And yeah, it‘s superb. I think I had written it off before because of the religious elements, but I am so engrossed in the story that you better believe I‘ll be reading book 2.
pickThis is a heavy read. It‘s deep. It‘s complex. The characters, the issues, the world. It‘s scary because it‘s not far from current issues and the brink we are living with climate change and covid. I‘ll be thinking about this one for some time. There‘s so much to take in and absorb. It‘s interesting that Butler‘s ideas of the world in the 90‘s are not too far off from what we are living in ‘24. Exaggerated, but not by much.
#motivationalmonday 1. Have new dishwasher installed (old one broke last week) and celebrate younger son‘s 19th birthday 🎂 2. Dark now, but our covered patio furniture 🌖 3. Dublin, Ohio, suburb of Columbus - warm and sunny today 😎 4. Tagged 👆🏻📖🎧
Glad I took an extra “just in case” book with me on my travels. It‘ll come in handy with an unexpected extended stay.
pickThis 1993 book hit a little too close to home at times. Butler‘s book remains relevant and insightful.
Started reading this one and I love the style of this first person narrative. I‘m 7 chapters in and the whole thing is thought provoking. Where have I been in science fiction land to have missed Octavia Butler? I only heard about her when she died but never read her works until now. And boy is this a doozy. Her thoughts and ideas on religion are truly unique and giving the narrative to a YA teenager makes it innocent and compelling.
pickSo good. So hard. The book starts in 2024 and looks at a world ravaged by climate change, poverty, and corruption. It‘s a tale of survival and adaptation, change and consistency. This is the kind of book that stays with you. It‘s a gentle but persistent haunting.
pickLauren lives in a gated community with her family, she feels other people's pleasure and pain. Lauren knows the world can only get darker.
Written in a diary format this is Earthseed, the Books of the Living.
My second book by the author and her writing is extremely accessible and her insights are very realistic. The world she creates here isn't that far fetched anymore.
pickBleak, grim, & all too real. Butler was prescient in how dystopia comes to be; it's emerging in pockets of societies all over the world as a culmination of fascism & the capitalist climate crisis. Reading this was hard & it gave me nightmares. Reading it right now is too much. Butler's writing is both beautiful & matter-of-fact. I found myself wanting to debate Earthseed with Lauren. I find myself wanting to ask Butler how to get out of this mess.
pick2024: 8
First 5 star read of the year. Octavia Butler's books give me anxiety in the best way. Her novels and characters are easy to get invested in so you really feel the story. This post apocalyptic novel is terrifying in how ordinary the atrocities happening are. There's no super bug or nuclear fall out, just plain old human hubris. Massive inflation, water shortages, and gross wealth disparity lead America to regress.
pickParable of the Sower depicts an America that deals with a water crisis, wildfires, unemployment and general collapse of society. It‘s a dystopia set in 2024 (yikes) and it actually & brutally shows what women would have to fear in such a situation, so be aware, there is a lot of sexual violence shown.
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️,5/5
Due to a StoryGraph challenge I finally got to read a book by this great writer. Had no idea what to expect going in, just what a friend told me: it is dark. Dark? Extremely dark! It's the darkest dystopian book I've ever read: kept hoping things are getting better, but did they ever? What made the book bearable were the Earthseed verses at the start of each chapter, bringing some hope.
Definitely a pick!
@PuddleJumper alt #Roll100 October pick
pickI admit to being just a bit tired of post apocalypse fiction. And this is an ‘after the end of the world‘ tale with no zombies, pandemic or alien invaders. It‘s simply the future we expect, after neglecting our environment and democracy for decades. But in the hands of this writer, we get a deeply human account of what life means after the fall. What is the purpose of continuing on. What keeps us going. At times sad, but ultimately uplifting.
pickVery good, but not the least bit enjoyable to read, IMO. Which, to be fair, is mostly how I feel about dystopian fiction in general - the present is terrifying enough, I don‘t like to imagine this very possible future! The first 90% is bleak, but some hope shows up toward the end. I don‘t think I could read the sequel. #52books23 #dystopian
#whimsicalreads It's book discussion time!!!! What did everyone take from this book?!
@Linsy @ShelleyBooksie @gracielee8 @SamAnne @MrsRoberts96 @joolz_92 @RedxoHearts @Clwojick @Read4life @wanderinglynn @Allylu @AbigailJaneBlog @persephone1408 @KristiAhlers @GirlNamedJesse @BooksNBowls @Liatrek @PageShifter @ozma.of.oz @BrittanyReads @tokorowilliamwallace @BookBelle84
pick4⭐ for writing and world building, this is the mother to most dystopian books we see nowadays.
But on a personal level I didn't enjoy this. It is really dark, and missing the hope that more current books have been able to bring in. I did enjoy it more than the last couple of Pattermaster books which were too violent and focused on "breeding". So I would recommend this more. It is interesting how Lauren is building a cult, I will read book 2.
JULY 2024.
I should have waited until next year to read this!
It is always interesting to read a dystopian book written decades ago while you are in the future they imagined.
so-soThis is one of those books that has great writing and a good storyline but was a process for me to get through as I felt I was very bored the whole time I was reading it. This is a read perfect for discussions, though, as it talks about a futuristic earth and what it could possibly become. I can't wait to discuss with #whimsicalreads book club at the end of the month.
