Pop Rocket Readers discussion

Open thread for the Pop Rocket summer book group

Just finished the book last night and would love to hear from others about where you are in the book/what you're thinking.

One of the strange/transporting things about the book for me was that it is so close -- in time (set in 2024) and place (I live in Northern California). I kept juxtaposing my own experience onto the book and it made for a surreal experience, to the point where I started dreaming about it.

I thought that the simple, spare prose of the narrator worked very well and highlighted the situation they were in. The violence of that society was terrifyingly realistic. No zombies; just desperate people.

I found the first part of the book to be the most frightening, as they are just huddled in the walled community and you KNOW the walls are eventually going to be breached.

What did you think of the religion?

I was surprised there wasn't more exploration of the racial structures/racism they encountered. That was touched on very lightly. Then again, just surviving took up all of their energy.

What did you think?

I'm really having a hard time forcing myself to keep going, not because it isn't a good book but because this all seems to be just around the corner unlike say a zombie apocalypse. I'm at about the 1/2 way point of the book, just about the point where a main character goes missing. I should be done in a day or two. I have a feeling that this isn't going to end up with a happy ending all tied up in a pretty pink bow, and it would probably piss me off if it did.

I've just finished the book, the ending was more pleasant than I expected it to be although it was a walk through hot coals to get there. This reminded me a lot of The Road by Cormac McCarthy, both very bleak tales of what could happen in the very near future. I found the Earth Seed religion and the view of god very interesting. As a evangelical atheist I still appreciate god or gods as a plot device and motivating factor for character development the same as ghost and other supernatural phenomenon even though I don't believe in those either.
I think we are just a soft nudge away from the social and economic dynamics in the book and that's a reason this one was hard for me. Indentured servitude and company towns could be just around the corner and some people, like the Koch Brothers, I think would be happy to see it. I remember the stories my grandmother use to tell about living in the coal mining village and she still had company script that my grandfather had been paid with.
All in all an excellent book, just not what you should read if you're already fatigued by the current political theater being played out in America.

I think we are just a soft nudge away from the social and economic dynamics in the book and that's a reason this one was hard for me.
Yes, I agree. I do want to read the second volume, though.

Yes! I had nightmares every night I was reading this book but as soon as I finished I requested the sequel from my library!

OK, here's another thing I thought about as I was reading the book and I'm still thinking about: one of the most painful parts of the book was the number of people who could not be helped, who could not be saved. And for a book that's also about salvation and redemption, that was a very tricky and powerful juxtaposition. The scene where Lauren comes across the children cannibals, for example, and she just backs away. They're children! And yet she saves some -- some but not others.

And of course we all make choices about what it is possible for us to do and what's not possible. It isn't as stark as that. But what kind of calculus is necessary? And what formulations guide us?

There are still lots of things percolating in my brain from that book.

This book filled me with dread and nausea throughout. I was always waiting for the shoe to drop and Lauren or another member of the group to die horribly (RIP Jill). The beginning was dark and terrifying but at least there was some hope at the end. I think I will need to reread this in several years to gain some perspective and reflect on the lessons of Parable of the Sower (PotS).

I read the ebook version and they provided the first three chapters of Parable of the Talents. I'm already hooked.

I've read a lot of dystopian fiction by white men and it was good to have a black female view of social decay. Other road tales like The Road or the Walking Dead have similar tropes and ideals, but the empathy for others is often lacking. I notice Robert Kirkman's characters in Walking Dead often having to justify acts of mercy and altruism much like Lauren in PotS. It's a very challenging moral situation that I cannot imagine having to make. Who can you save?