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Daughters of Earth
For readers in-the-know it's Judith Merril's three-in-one. What possibly could be better than a new Judith Merril SF treat? The answer is easy - three dazzling new Merril novels in a single volume!
Project Nursemaid
Daughters of Earth
Homecalling
To the moon...to the planets...to the stars...Here is a trio that provides a rich feast for all who savor soaring imagination and jolting action. Here is the incomparable Judith Merril at her best. Here is the ultimate in science fiction adventure.
Project Nursemaid
Daughters of Earth
Homecalling
To the moon...to the planets...to the stars...Here is a trio that provides a rich feast for all who savor soaring imagination and jolting action. Here is the incomparable Judith Merril at her best. Here is the ultimate in science fiction adventure.
192 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1968
85 people want to read
About the author
Judith Merril
165 books47 followersJosephine Juliet Grossman
aka Cyril Judd (with C.M. Kornbluth)
Judith Josephine Grossman (Boston, Massachusetts, January 21, 1923 - Toronto, Ontario, September 12, 1997), who took the pen-name Judith Merril about 1945, was an American and then Canadian science fiction writer, editor and political activist.
Although Judith Merril's first paid writing was in other genres, in her first few years of writing published science fiction she wrote her three novels (all but the first in collaboration with C.M. Kornbluth) and some stories. Her roughly four decades in that genre also included writing 26 published short stories, and editing a similar number of anthologies.
aka Cyril Judd (with C.M. Kornbluth)
Judith Josephine Grossman (Boston, Massachusetts, January 21, 1923 - Toronto, Ontario, September 12, 1997), who took the pen-name Judith Merril about 1945, was an American and then Canadian science fiction writer, editor and political activist.
Although Judith Merril's first paid writing was in other genres, in her first few years of writing published science fiction she wrote her three novels (all but the first in collaboration with C.M. Kornbluth) and some stories. Her roughly four decades in that genre also included writing 26 published short stories, and editing a similar number of anthologies.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
May 24, 2019
I'm actually quite surprised, i don't know why but i wasn't expecting to like these 3 novellas that much. The writing is straightforward but.. i was going to say everything's easy to picture but thats not quite true, its just that everything has great... verisimilitude, lets go with that. I completely bought into each fiction even when elements were confusing or should have felt sillier if written differently.
Project Nursemaid [4/5]
This is so like a script for a low-budget 50's sci-fi film. Half-way through i realised i was picturing it all in black & white :P . It all takes place almost entirely in little offices as if they're trying to save money on sets :lol. Dashing young doctor as the protagonist, plenty of smoking, drinking and flirting, only some of the social issues would have prevented it being made into a 50's film. Really its just a professional drama with sci-fi elements, not sure why i liked it so much but i did.
Daughters of Earth [4/5]
Far less hard sci-fi than the previous one, this is an epistolary story and is somewhat confused and fragmented. Some elements akin to the show 'Earth 2' from the '90s. But at its core is about a woman trying to connect with her estranged/somewhat daughter. Reminded me of the voice over sections of 'Arrival' movie in places.
Homecalling [4/5]
Kind of like the The Wee Free Men in space... thats a terrible analogy. This one is almost philosophical, its cute and interesting and kind of messed up, Its a 'Disney' movie in waiting ;) . At one point i had to check if my e-copy was damaged, it wasn't, there's a bit of almost cut-up- technique used in places that part was confusing but makes sense given the strange circumstances. Kind of leaves you hanging at the end but provokes a lot of thoughts :) .
Edit: Available from the openlibrary.org .
Project Nursemaid [4/5]
This is so like a script for a low-budget 50's sci-fi film. Half-way through i realised i was picturing it all in black & white :P . It all takes place almost entirely in little offices as if they're trying to save money on sets :lol. Dashing young doctor as the protagonist, plenty of smoking, drinking and flirting, only some of the social issues would have prevented it being made into a 50's film. Really its just a professional drama with sci-fi elements, not sure why i liked it so much but i did.
Daughters of Earth [4/5]
Far less hard sci-fi than the previous one, this is an epistolary story and is somewhat confused and fragmented. Some elements akin to the show 'Earth 2' from the '90s. But at its core is about a woman trying to connect with her estranged/somewhat daughter. Reminded me of the voice over sections of 'Arrival' movie in places.
Homecalling [4/5]
Kind of like the The Wee Free Men in space... thats a terrible analogy. This one is almost philosophical, its cute and interesting and kind of messed up, Its a 'Disney' movie in waiting ;) . At one point i had to check if my e-copy was damaged, it wasn't, there's a bit of almost cut-up- technique used in places that part was confusing but makes sense given the strange circumstances. Kind of leaves you hanging at the end but provokes a lot of thoughts :) .
Edit: Available from the openlibrary.org .
March 22, 2024
Project Nursemaid: I love that it's about a military effort at social engineering, told at the stage where it's pretty well established (and apparently established as a Good Thing), but whilst still struggling to find a way to succeed. Usually classic social SF explores the stage of 'should we do this thing' or 'omg we've done this thing now what?'
So Merril showed us some ideas of a lot of different people, in different roles, dealing with the idea. The idea being, how to establish a colony on the Moon that will be healthy despite the low gravity? Well, nurture the colonists in low gravity from the earliest moment that they can be safely C-sectioned from their mothers, generally young women 'in trouble.' Of course the young women have to apply, and have to pass all sorts of screenings, both psychological and medical.
Also needed are foster parents who have to apply and pass screenings. In both cases, "PN" and "FP," very few of the applicants actually qualify. What to do? I wondered all along why they didn't implement the solution I saw as obvious, and even when they finally did figure it out I'm not sure why they didn't earlier... but the story is not about the ending, it's about the ideas explored on the journey. And, yes, those are the words. Explore, and Journey; very good SF words.
A somewhat dated story but I quite liked it.
Daughters of Earth: Merril can write awfully well. I'm still struggling to figure out why she interrupted an elegy to generations of women explorers with a disturbing story of first contact. And to figure out why she wrote it that the colonists did not have a first contact protocol in place.
It's a strange work, but definitely worth reading & pondering. Even if the socio-political strategies seem odd to us nowadays... or maybe *because* they seem odd: remember that few women were writing SF back then, and most who were, were writing works that were more stridently feminist. So it's of historical value, as well as philosophical and entertaining value.
Homecalling: First contact, brilliantly done with 'aliens' who are truly alien, but clearly 'people' too. But the focus is on mothers, not on warriors, or priests, or empire-builders. Merril's theme in all of these, and in her most famous short story (That Only a Mother), is about mothers, motherhood, daughters. A theme that gets almost no exploration in speculative fiction, but is obviously a huge part of our lives....
If you know of any other SFF works on the theme of motherhood, please comment!!
So Merril showed us some ideas of a lot of different people, in different roles, dealing with the idea. The idea being, how to establish a colony on the Moon that will be healthy despite the low gravity? Well, nurture the colonists in low gravity from the earliest moment that they can be safely C-sectioned from their mothers, generally young women 'in trouble.' Of course the young women have to apply, and have to pass all sorts of screenings, both psychological and medical.
Also needed are foster parents who have to apply and pass screenings. In both cases, "PN" and "FP," very few of the applicants actually qualify. What to do? I wondered all along why they didn't implement the solution I saw as obvious, and even when they finally did figure it out I'm not sure why they didn't earlier... but the story is not about the ending, it's about the ideas explored on the journey. And, yes, those are the words. Explore, and Journey; very good SF words.
A somewhat dated story but I quite liked it.
Daughters of Earth: Merril can write awfully well. I'm still struggling to figure out why she interrupted an elegy to generations of women explorers with a disturbing story of first contact. And to figure out why she wrote it that the colonists did not have a first contact protocol in place.
It's a strange work, but definitely worth reading & pondering. Even if the socio-political strategies seem odd to us nowadays... or maybe *because* they seem odd: remember that few women were writing SF back then, and most who were, were writing works that were more stridently feminist. So it's of historical value, as well as philosophical and entertaining value.
Homecalling: First contact, brilliantly done with 'aliens' who are truly alien, but clearly 'people' too. But the focus is on mothers, not on warriors, or priests, or empire-builders. Merril's theme in all of these, and in her most famous short story (That Only a Mother), is about mothers, motherhood, daughters. A theme that gets almost no exploration in speculative fiction, but is obviously a huge part of our lives....
If you know of any other SFF works on the theme of motherhood, please comment!!
August 5, 2018
Daughters of Earth is a trio of sci-fi stories. The front cover claims they’re novels. They aren’t. Some of them might be novellas. Others are … novelettes? It doesn’t matter. They’re definitely stories, and thus I shall call them.
The first—Project Nursemaid—revolves around some cockamamie scheme to help humans adjust to low-gravity situations by exposing them from birth/infancy to nothing but a low-gravity atmosphere. As the US army doesn’t just have babies on hand (a sign that this future world is better than our current one in at least some ways) they resort to asking pregnant women who would rather not deal with the punitive societal repercussions of having a child* if it would be rather okay to just yank that baby out at five months, swap ‘em over to an incubator of some sort, and ship them into space.
*there is one outlier, a poor woman who is told that if she carries the baby to term, they’ll both die. She hopes this is the better option.
Anyway, this story is both gross and boring. It’s steeped in the casual, paternal, misogyny of the 50s. All women are feeble and childish and need the strong support and unwavering attention of a man to keep them from doing something stupid. Never mind that these women couldn’t have gotten pregnant without the help of a man ...
I won’t even bother going into the specific examples of how and why Project Nursemaid is gross; I could write a dissertation on the subject. I will say, though, that it did make me grateful for how much things have changed. I know—I know too well—that women still have to put up with a seemingly insurmountable level of misogynistic bullshit, but at least these days a guy concluding an interview with a teenage girl can’t kiss her on the forehead. In Project Nursemaid, he does so without even an inkling of self-doubt.
Outside of all the gross, Project Nursemaid is also boring. I quit 50 pages in, and from my brief summary of the story, you know roughly as much as I do. There was no real hook, no intrigue, just a bunch of sad women and some scheme involving low gravity.
I quit the story without hesitation, and bounded onto the next one wondering if I was wasting my time.
I’m glad my well of optimism runs deep, because Daughters of Earth, the titular story of the book, is incredible. It’s a grandmother’s gift to her adventuring granddaughter: a history of the women in their family’s incredible adventures. From the earth to the moon, from the moon to mars, from mars to pluto, from pluto to Ullern, Every-other woman in their family has striven to exceed the ordinary and press beyond the known, and now the granddaughter will continue this tradition by being a part of the first expedition into the past.
This still isn’t a traditional story. The hooks are minimal; it reads like a memoir—because, if fact, that’s exactly how it’s written. It rambles from time to time, the repetitions in storytelling are clearly a stylistic choice rather than a reliable recount of historic events, and some moments are honed in on with loving details while others are passed in a blink.
I would have never guessed to find a fictional memoir passionate and powerful, yet Daughters of Earth reads with an honesty that is hard to disregard. It makes me wonder about Judith Merril and her background—she has to have been a trailblazer, and resonated deeply with the sentiment, if not the exact experience, of her protagonist.
The final story, Homecalling, is the tale of a nine-year-old girl crash-landed on an alien planet. She must take care of her infant brother until help arrives—if it comes at all. Meanwhile, the mother of a hivemind-like colony of alien-insects is very curious about the sudden arrival of outsiders, and these interlopers’ plan for their territory.
I adored the characterization of Dee, our pint-sized protagonist. She’s brave and vulnerable and very much a child. I rarely like stories with a child lead, but I’d have read a full-length about Dee.
I also adored the characterization of Daydanda, the mother of the insect-aliens. She’s very much alien, but not at all confusing—and that’s saying something because her mind is all over the place. I find most depictions of telepathy to be both confusing and somewhat self-indulgent, but I felt none of this while watching Daydanda watch Dee. Actually, I think the way telepathy is woven through the story is one of its highlights.
I’ve read other reviews that dowplayed Homecoming slightly for its lack of a complicated plot. I disagree. The trippiness of the telepathy added enough intrigue that I didn’t need any bate-and-switch plot devices to keep be engaged, and though I’m almost the literal worst at reading between the lines, even I could see a depth that wasn’t completely spelled out regarding Daydanda’s obsession with the spaceship.
Okay, there were maybe three pages in the middle that felt a little slow to me, but they were well-worth it to reach the end.
Project Nursemaid was a boring let down. Homecalling and Daughters of Earth knocked it out of the park, especially with how they wove characterization and the power of being human in with decidedly sci-fi stories and storytelling.
I can totally get into that.
Had Project Nursemaid been swapped out for a better story, I'd have given this 5/5. Consider both Daughters of Earth and Homecalling to be 5/5, though.
[I read old fantasy and sci-fi novels written by women authors in search of forgotten gems. See more at forfemfan.com]
The first—Project Nursemaid—revolves around some cockamamie scheme to help humans adjust to low-gravity situations by exposing them from birth/infancy to nothing but a low-gravity atmosphere. As the US army doesn’t just have babies on hand (a sign that this future world is better than our current one in at least some ways) they resort to asking pregnant women who would rather not deal with the punitive societal repercussions of having a child* if it would be rather okay to just yank that baby out at five months, swap ‘em over to an incubator of some sort, and ship them into space.
*there is one outlier, a poor woman who is told that if she carries the baby to term, they’ll both die. She hopes this is the better option.
Anyway, this story is both gross and boring. It’s steeped in the casual, paternal, misogyny of the 50s. All women are feeble and childish and need the strong support and unwavering attention of a man to keep them from doing something stupid. Never mind that these women couldn’t have gotten pregnant without the help of a man ...
I won’t even bother going into the specific examples of how and why Project Nursemaid is gross; I could write a dissertation on the subject. I will say, though, that it did make me grateful for how much things have changed. I know—I know too well—that women still have to put up with a seemingly insurmountable level of misogynistic bullshit, but at least these days a guy concluding an interview with a teenage girl can’t kiss her on the forehead. In Project Nursemaid, he does so without even an inkling of self-doubt.
Outside of all the gross, Project Nursemaid is also boring. I quit 50 pages in, and from my brief summary of the story, you know roughly as much as I do. There was no real hook, no intrigue, just a bunch of sad women and some scheme involving low gravity.
I quit the story without hesitation, and bounded onto the next one wondering if I was wasting my time.
I’m glad my well of optimism runs deep, because Daughters of Earth, the titular story of the book, is incredible. It’s a grandmother’s gift to her adventuring granddaughter: a history of the women in their family’s incredible adventures. From the earth to the moon, from the moon to mars, from mars to pluto, from pluto to Ullern, Every-other woman in their family has striven to exceed the ordinary and press beyond the known, and now the granddaughter will continue this tradition by being a part of the first expedition into the past.
This still isn’t a traditional story. The hooks are minimal; it reads like a memoir—because, if fact, that’s exactly how it’s written. It rambles from time to time, the repetitions in storytelling are clearly a stylistic choice rather than a reliable recount of historic events, and some moments are honed in on with loving details while others are passed in a blink.
I would have never guessed to find a fictional memoir passionate and powerful, yet Daughters of Earth reads with an honesty that is hard to disregard. It makes me wonder about Judith Merril and her background—she has to have been a trailblazer, and resonated deeply with the sentiment, if not the exact experience, of her protagonist.
The final story, Homecalling, is the tale of a nine-year-old girl crash-landed on an alien planet. She must take care of her infant brother until help arrives—if it comes at all. Meanwhile, the mother of a hivemind-like colony of alien-insects is very curious about the sudden arrival of outsiders, and these interlopers’ plan for their territory.
I adored the characterization of Dee, our pint-sized protagonist. She’s brave and vulnerable and very much a child. I rarely like stories with a child lead, but I’d have read a full-length about Dee.
I also adored the characterization of Daydanda, the mother of the insect-aliens. She’s very much alien, but not at all confusing—and that’s saying something because her mind is all over the place. I find most depictions of telepathy to be both confusing and somewhat self-indulgent, but I felt none of this while watching Daydanda watch Dee. Actually, I think the way telepathy is woven through the story is one of its highlights.
I’ve read other reviews that dowplayed Homecoming slightly for its lack of a complicated plot. I disagree. The trippiness of the telepathy added enough intrigue that I didn’t need any bate-and-switch plot devices to keep be engaged, and though I’m almost the literal worst at reading between the lines, even I could see a depth that wasn’t completely spelled out regarding Daydanda’s obsession with the spaceship.
Okay, there were maybe three pages in the middle that felt a little slow to me, but they were well-worth it to reach the end.
Project Nursemaid was a boring let down. Homecalling and Daughters of Earth knocked it out of the park, especially with how they wove characterization and the power of being human in with decidedly sci-fi stories and storytelling.
I can totally get into that.
Had Project Nursemaid been swapped out for a better story, I'd have given this 5/5. Consider both Daughters of Earth and Homecalling to be 5/5, though.
[I read old fantasy and sci-fi novels written by women authors in search of forgotten gems. See more at forfemfan.com]
May 21, 2019
This is an impressive set of three novellas (the book claims they are novels, but each is under 100 pages). All deal to some extent with parenting, especially mothering, though in very different ways. The first, "Project Nursemaid," focuses on the difficulty of finding qualified surrogate mothers for children to be raised in space, given that no mature human can stand the low-gravity conditions on the Moon for longer than a few months. The second, "Daughters of Earth," is a rather oddly-structured multi-general tale of mothers, daughters, space exploration, and first contact. The third, though, "Homecalling," is the standout: two children whose parents died when their spaceship crashed on an unknown planet encounter the native species, insectoid hive creatures ruled by a matriarch. The handling of mutually alien cultures trying to come to understand each other (especially when one is represented only by a child and an infant) is remarkably well-done. This is the least dated of the stories, the first one being the most dated, but all remain very good examples of classic SF and remain eminently readable and insightful.
October 11, 2012
An impressive collection of stories to come out of mid-century science fiction--especially considering the genre's stereotypes! These stories
are not wholly ignorant of or degrading to women, some are about women, and from women's perspectives--even written by a woman! A world of difference from the last short-story book I read from that era.
'Project Nursemaid' is probably the least interesting of the three, and strangely, for this book, seems focused from the gaze of an authoritative, patriarchal colonel. He's the head of a program to stock the moon with orphans (i.e. he provides 'space-abortions' to nervous young ladies who don't want to besmirch their honor) and provide for them foster care. He helps a pregnant 19-year-old save face in her boarding school/college, and reunites her with her baby-daddy... and is able to squeeze a brothel madam into the foster service only when generals from above complain about the delayed progress of the program. Anyway, not the most progressive story of the book, but the characters and their perspectives had some compelling moments.
'Daughters of Earth' was a fantastic story! One of the best and most interesting long-voyage stories I've read. Very strong (grand)mother-(grand)daughter connections. Touching moments, interesting scientific conjecture, and a story form with an almost poetic thematic reinforcement.
'Homecalling' was amusing. I thought the pacing in the story a bit strange, perhaps though because the main perspective was from a 9-year-old. I also thought the story built up to a lackluster ending--it's not that I didn't like it, I just didn't find the tension-relief point of the story to be very meaningful. In retrospect this probably means I wasn't empathizing with the characters enough, for, from their perspectives the scene should have relieved some tension.
I'm glad to have read this book and will recommend it to young sci-fi enthusiasts and anyone interested in less-biased golden-age science fiction. Individually I would give 'Project Nursemaid' 3/5 stars, 'Daughters of Earth' 5/5 stars, and 'Homecalling' 4/5 stars, with the influence of DoE outweighing the other two.
are not wholly ignorant of or degrading to women, some are about women, and from women's perspectives--even written by a woman! A world of difference from the last short-story book I read from that era.
'Project Nursemaid' is probably the least interesting of the three, and strangely, for this book, seems focused from the gaze of an authoritative, patriarchal colonel. He's the head of a program to stock the moon with orphans (i.e. he provides 'space-abortions' to nervous young ladies who don't want to besmirch their honor) and provide for them foster care. He helps a pregnant 19-year-old save face in her boarding school/college, and reunites her with her baby-daddy... and is able to squeeze a brothel madam into the foster service only when generals from above complain about the delayed progress of the program. Anyway, not the most progressive story of the book, but the characters and their perspectives had some compelling moments.
'Daughters of Earth' was a fantastic story! One of the best and most interesting long-voyage stories I've read. Very strong (grand)mother-(grand)daughter connections. Touching moments, interesting scientific conjecture, and a story form with an almost poetic thematic reinforcement.
'Homecalling' was amusing. I thought the pacing in the story a bit strange, perhaps though because the main perspective was from a 9-year-old. I also thought the story built up to a lackluster ending--it's not that I didn't like it, I just didn't find the tension-relief point of the story to be very meaningful. In retrospect this probably means I wasn't empathizing with the characters enough, for, from their perspectives the scene should have relieved some tension.
I'm glad to have read this book and will recommend it to young sci-fi enthusiasts and anyone interested in less-biased golden-age science fiction. Individually I would give 'Project Nursemaid' 3/5 stars, 'Daughters of Earth' 5/5 stars, and 'Homecalling' 4/5 stars, with the influence of DoE outweighing the other two.
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April 28, 2021This book was published in 1970 and the copyright page says 1968, but the actual content is three novellas (or novelettes - I'm not sure of the distinction) that were published in the 1950s.
Project Nursemaid (1955) has a male main character, an Army (or Space Force?) colonel working on a project to find babies and foster mothers to live on the moon. I thought this was the worst of the three. It felt very dated and misogynist, despite being written by a woman.
Daughters of Earth (1952) was my favorite. This goes through several generations of women, alternating by those who wanted to travel in space and their mothers who wanted to stay home.
"Martha begat Joan, and Joan begat Ariadne. Ariadne lived and died at home on Pluto, but her daughter Emma took the long trip out to a distant planet of an alien sun.
Emma begat Leah, and Leah begat Carla, who was the first to make her bridal voyage through subspace..."
Homecalling (1956) was the oddest. The main characters are a nine year old girl and an alien "Mother" on the planet where the girl's family's spaceship crashes. This was the hardest to read.
Project Nursemaid (1955) has a male main character, an Army (or Space Force?) colonel working on a project to find babies and foster mothers to live on the moon. I thought this was the worst of the three. It felt very dated and misogynist, despite being written by a woman.
Daughters of Earth (1952) was my favorite. This goes through several generations of women, alternating by those who wanted to travel in space and their mothers who wanted to stay home.
"Martha begat Joan, and Joan begat Ariadne. Ariadne lived and died at home on Pluto, but her daughter Emma took the long trip out to a distant planet of an alien sun.
Emma begat Leah, and Leah begat Carla, who was the first to make her bridal voyage through subspace..."
Homecalling (1956) was the oddest. The main characters are a nine year old girl and an alien "Mother" on the planet where the girl's family's spaceship crashes. This was the hardest to read.
April 12, 2020
Full review: https://sciencefictionruminations.com...
"Judith Merril was not only an important early science fiction author of novels and short stories but a political activist and a member of the influential 1940s sci-fi group known as the Futurians (members included her husband Frederik Pohl, James Blish, Damon Knight, David A. Wollheim, C. M. Kornbluth, et al.). Her fascinating collection, Daughters of Earth (1968), contains three novellas from the 1950s: ‘Project Nursemaid’ (1955), the highlight of the collection — ‘Daughters of Earth’ (1952), and the underwhelming ‘Homecalling’ (1956).
All three contain a plethora [...]"
"Judith Merril was not only an important early science fiction author of novels and short stories but a political activist and a member of the influential 1940s sci-fi group known as the Futurians (members included her husband Frederik Pohl, James Blish, Damon Knight, David A. Wollheim, C. M. Kornbluth, et al.). Her fascinating collection, Daughters of Earth (1968), contains three novellas from the 1950s: ‘Project Nursemaid’ (1955), the highlight of the collection — ‘Daughters of Earth’ (1952), and the underwhelming ‘Homecalling’ (1956).
All three contain a plethora [...]"
December 20, 2020
All three novellas were so insightful and smart- I don’t understand why Judith Merril isn’t more well known!
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August 22, 2008Daughters of Earth by Judith Merril (1970)
May 26, 2018
Three novellas and I very much enjoyed two of them. Worth looking up.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews