The Parable of the Sower

“Hyperempathy is what the doctors call an “organic delusional syndrome.” Big shit. It hurts, that’s all I know. Thanks to Paracetco, the smart pill, the Einstein powder, the particular drug my mother chose to abuse before my birth killed her, I’m crazy. I get a lot of grief that doesn’t belong to me, and that isn’t real. But it hurts.”

The story establishes a future California, USA which is dystopian, or rather in what could be called a long, ugly decline. Nothing extraordinary about the decline so I assume the primary factor is climate change, but it is not made explicit. This is not apocalypse, there are still lots of people, actual government with paper currency, but of the characters (all brown or mixed-race), they are all struggling to survive; they only see distant glimpses of progress, prosperity such as space travel, wall-sized televisions, safe corporate settlements, paying jobs in the Washington, Canada.

The structure of this book is of a frog being boiled. It begins in a walled village in the town of “Robledo” (20 miles north of LA) with several small tragedies over a few years leading to complete disaster (Lauren is sole survivor in family) in the middle of the story. Our protagonist emerges to begin a pilgrimage north with a slow improvement in conditions in the second half. It ends with Lauren and her new clan settled somewhere around Mendocino and having chosen a mate (but not quite married)

There are few fantastical or technological plot devices:

• Lauren’s “Hyperempathy” (which sounds suspiciously like a psychic ability.)
• The firebug mobs who burn things because of a recreational drug’s psychological side-effect.

Our protagonist/narrator, Lauren Oya Olamina, is the most extraordinary element in the story:

• At the beginning of the story she is 15 but she has been writing a philosophical/religious text, The Book of Earthseed, from age eight(!) in direct contradiction to the ideas of her evangelical preacher father.
• She has the foresight alone in her family to prepare for the catastrophe she will face (her bug-out bag containing seeds!)
• She is instantly respected by her peers as a leader.

Who could she be modeled after except biblical prophets? This story is Lauren’s origin story and her collected clan contains the disciples of a future religion.

Issues with the book:

• It doesn’t pretend to land - there must be a sequel. I assume this has to do with writer/editor/publishing economics: if she was Stephen King the Parable books would be one book.
• Lauren’s Hyperempathy is discussed but doesn’t really further the plot in an important way. (If you show us a gun, it better get used)
• Whether Lauren is a plausible character is arguable, but I bought/liked her.