What's the Name of That Book??? discussion

In the early 70's I read a sci fi book and the theme was gestalt. I believe the author was exploring the idea of gestalt and what that would look like if humans started evolving. I remember the children all started sitting in groups talking to each other telepathically and they did not care about society. The adults started out thinking there was something wrong with them but more and more children changed until all of them were thinking in a hive like mind.

I think the author's last name started with a 'W' but am not sure. I read Clarke's Childhoods End about the same time and confused the two but it is not that book.

If it's not Childhoods end, it could be Howard Fast's The First Men http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fi..., or Sturgeon's More than Human. Neither are a perfect fit, though.

Were the children clones? If so, it might be Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang by Kate Wilhelm.

There is a scene in the Fast story in which a group of kids are sitting in a circle and then start being able to read each other's minds. They can also destroy an inconvenient boulder with their minds.

Hive Mind article in the SF encyclopedia http://www.sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/...

Andy,

Thanks for that link. I recognized the author's name, John Wyndham. I searched his books on Amazon and found the book. It is The Midwich Cucoos. It is not in the database on this website.

http://www.amazon.com/Midwich-Cuckoos...

Great. I should have thought of "Midwich Cuckoos" as a possibility - it was made into the movie "Village of the Damned" by the way.

Corbett, it is in the database - there are 57 editions actually.

https://www.goodreads.com/work/editio...