From the Bookshelf of EVERYONE Has Read This but Me - The Catch-Up Book Club…

Kindred

Octavia E. Butler

Start date: December 1, 2022

Finish date: December 31, 2022

Discussion: MODERN / POPULAR READS

Why we're reading this: December 2022 - Modern Selection
[close] December 2022 - Modern Selection

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What Members Thought

Jan 14, 2019 Christina rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2019, dcvsmarvel-2019-dj

4.5 stars

5 likes · Like · see review

Oct 22, 2019 spoko rated it it was amazing

Shelves: re-read, history, race, fiction, sci-fi, reading-with-kids, gender, speculative

This was the most thought-provoking book I've read in quite a while. I'm not particularly drawn to sci-fi books, so I was glad that the mechanics of Dana's time travel didn't get much time in this book. But the implications of her choices and actions were complicated and profound, and I'll be thinking about them for some time. I read it with my wife and son, and we've already had several really good conversations about both the content and the form of the book. (By the way, the exposition early ...more

3 likes · Like · see review

Dec 07, 2015 Jen rated it really liked it

I would never had picked this book up if not for it being a book group read; which is why we attend book groups right? And not until I looked at it on Goodreads before I started reading did I figure out it was a sci-fi book. That put me off a little because that's not a genre I particularly enjoy. And while time travel is a central plot device in this book, it's not the theme, and so for those of you like me that might think - sci fi - really? - it's not a sci fi book in the traditional sense. N I would never had picked this book up if not for it being a book group read; which is why we attend book groups right? And not until I looked at it on Goodreads before I started reading did I figure out it was a sci-fi book. That put me off a little because that's not a genre I particularly enjoy. And while time travel is a central plot device in this book, it's not the theme, and so for those of you like me that might think - sci fi - really? - it's not a sci fi book in the traditional sense. Not any more than say The Time Traveler's Wife.

It was a really difficult book to read, because it's about Dana, the protag's experience with slavery, and experiencing it as a 26 year old resident of Los Angeles. The culture shock is obvious, and then sometimes not. Dana is married to a white man (Kevin) in 1976, and he even makes one of her jumps to antebellum Maryland, where she is sent to save Rufus, an ancestor and slave holder, from himself time and time again. Kevin is liberal, and has in fact rejected his racist family to marry Dana, but the way he deals with the violence both small and large of slavery is different, less felt and certainly less personally than the way Dana does. It makes you think about how the injustices of race relations in 1976 (and now even) are felt differently by those aware of it and those experiencing it directly. I did really enjoy Kevin as a character and a foil to Dana, and you could tell that they were very deeply in love by the actions, but the feeeling between the two characters I felt was a bit undeveloped.

The other thing that I found fascinating about this was the way Dana found herself kind of 'giving in' little by little over time to being a slave. The violence and the very real and ever-present threat of violence that slaves, and free black persons in the antebellum south felt and lived every day makes the erosion of one's freedom necessary, and it's heartbreaking and awful. It also gives me even more respect and admiration for those that stood up, spoke out, ran away, and changed that world. ...more

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Jan 03, 2020 Amy Ellis rated it it was amazing

This book completely sucked me in from the first page. The plot seems far-fetched: In 1976, Dana randomly wakes up in 1815 on her ancestor’s plantation. She eventually returns to her home but gets called back several more times. I loved that it was less a time travel story and more a narrative of life on a plantation. There are some difficult scenes of slave treatment, but it is thought-provoking, powerful, and creative. I will be thinking about this one for a long time.

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Feb 10, 2021 Olympia rated it it was amazing

Shelves: kindle-books, libby-books

Powerful novel.

My favorite quote one of many but this one tops the list. In Kindred Octavia Butler has designed her own Underground Railroad between past and present whose terminus is the reawakened imagination of the reader!
My first book in reading black authors for black history month challenge.

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