Kindred by Octavia E. Butler
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Web ID: 15624360Great book
I honestly surprisingly thought this book was great and a really good read coming from someone who could care less about reading. At first when I read this book I didn't think it would have such depth to it and be so interesting, I thought it was was gonna be another boring book that i had to read just because it was assigned to me in class but honestly when i actually started reading it gave me a feeling to keep reading a feeling i don't have with many books. I like how interesting the story is while it also has a mysterious sci-fi twist. The book follows a black woman living in California in the year 1976 who mysteriously gets transported out of nowhere to Baltimore Maryland, the antebellum south in the early 1800s. The first time she gets transported she finds and saves a young white boy named Rufus from drowning but is then almost shot by a man who turns out to be the young boy's father and then she is suddenly transported back to 1976 and that won't be the last time. When she is transported back her husband who is a white man is confused and tells Dana that she was there for a second and then vanished for a few seconds before coming back yet he doesn't believe that she was teleported back in time. She gets transported again back in time this time she has to save the young boy again and this is where we learn that the reason why she keeps transporting is because the young boy is an ancestor to dana and we learn in order for rufus to live she needs to protect him but deep down she is conflicted. As Dana keeps transporting it shows her the reality of slavery and how it was back then and this book does such a good job at describing and showing imagery due to it being in the first person point of view of dana. Although this book has some flaws along with it being intense at times i would still recommend this book even if you aren't really a heavy reader or enjoy reading books such as me i would still recommend it.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
New Fave
I personally really enjoyed reading this book in my class. Kindred took such an interesting and creative idea and turned it into an amazing rollercoaster of emotions and imagery. My main likes of the book was how the story of why Dana is getting sent back to the past and saving Rufus is revealed perfectly. As you read each chapter, you feel like you're piecing the puzzle together with Dana. You learn with Dana how her Ancestors lived and worked, and how her family tree came to be. I also love the way the author writes the dialogue for the characters who live in the 1800’s. You can feel the accents and cultural differences through the text and it made me feel immersed in the story. Another thing I like about this book is the characters themselves. I could tell easily that each of the characters was thought out thoroughly and was written with consistency throughout the book. Each character had a personality that fit them precisely and worked perfectly when they clashed with other characters. The author includes a ton of imagery that helps immerse the reader into the world of the 1800’s describing in detail some of the horrible things people of color were forced to endure. I feel that the imagery in the book details slavery in a way videos and documentaries can't, while also keeping you interested in the story of Dana and her ancestors. There are some things I didn't like about this book too. I feel while yes, the book includes slavery and people from those times had different names for certain people, there was a lot of usage of some pretty heavy slurs in the book. I would recommend not letting children or young teens read this book. There's also some usage of harsh topics like Sexual Assault and Rape, which again helps the story develop and details laws and culture in the 1800s but could be a trigger or a very hard topic for some readers. On a more personal note, I’m not a huge fan of how the dialogue is strung together, for me it was slightly confusing at times to distinguish who was talking until the next “she said”, “he said”, or “I said” came up in the text. I certainly feel that the pros of this book outweigh the cons and Kindred has 100% become one of my new favorite books.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Great book
I really loved this book a lot. It tells a story of a woman who was brought back in time mainly to save the life of a little boy. Although deep down, she was really drawn in so that she may look at her ancestral past and ensure that it carries out correctly so that she may exist. In my opinion, the theme of this book is that it is humanity's nature to become the people whom they spend their time with. This is shown in many different ways throughout the book, but it's strengths and weaknesses are what really make this theme clear to the reader. It really used lots of imagery to reflect the theme to the reader. Things like describing injuries and emotions of other people using different senses that relate to the reader. The diction for it was also very straightforward and didn't take a lot to understand the plot and meaning behind it. The book was written in a first-person perspective which made it easier to understand the narrator, but it was written in such a way that you were really reading the narration of multiple peoples perspectives. Although it has many strengths, it carries some weaknesses too, such as the fact that the plot felt way too rushed, especially nearing toward the end. Many of the events in the middle-to-end of the book took place right next to each other with minimal buildup in between. Another point where Kindred falls short is in the shifting of personalities in the characters. Many of the characters change over the course of the book. Not to say that it is a bad thing, matter of fact, I think it is important for this to take place in literature, but some of the shifts in personality do not fully align with the plot of the story, although they do portray the theme pretty well.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
So intriguing!
The book Kindred was written by Octavia. E Butler is one of the best complex historical fiction books to read. I read this book for a school project and although it was for a class I would recommend it to anyone interested in history, especially American history. The story follows Dana, an African American from 1976. She and her husband Kevin are both writers and have relatively normal lives until one day that all changes. One day Dana starts to feel strange and gets teleported back to the 1800s. When she gets there we meet Rufus who is the white child and son of slave owner Tom Weylin. When she returns to their present time her husband is confused and doesn't believe her and how she had to save a random child's life. As these strange events continue when Dana is teleported back and happens to save this kid's life, she stays longer and longer each time. The more time she spends there she can see how slaves are treated and she gets first-hand experience with it. For Dana, it seems that she is in the past for long periods but in the present, it's only a few hours so Kevin is worried for her and wonders what could be happening. He doesn't have to wonder for too long because he also gets sucked in with Dana on one of these occasions but this time is different. He's not like Dana, he can't teleport and gets stuck there for 5 years his time but it was only a few years for her. This was hard on both of them, Dana could only worry and not do anything to help and Kevin was stuck in the past where slavery was considered okay so he had to toughen up it changed quite a bit. Throughout the story, we learn the reason Dana had to keep Rufus alive was because he was an ancestor of hers so she had to protect him to protect herself. As Rufus got older he only got meaner and that was difficult for Dana because she watched him grow up but he got weird. I never really liked science fiction books but this is one I would recommend to others. I do have a few critics on how they didn't talk about Kevin's experience during those 5 years he was stuck in Maryland because he would be different since he was a white man instead of a black woman.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Wow....
This was my first time reading a scientific book, and I love it! I was hooked from the first page and finished the book in three days. The author’s writing between the past and present flowed so smoothly. It’s a story that makes you think about how connected you are to your family history and how it defines who you are now. It also helps you gain a better understanding of how African Americans survived during slavery.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Great read
Enjoyed every moment
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Literary Greatness!
I had heard of author Octavia E. Butler when she spoke at my graduate school a year before I joined the program. I learned about her novel KINDRED at that time. The idea of a modern-day African-American woman being drawn back to slavery times whenever a white man is troubled sounded like a book I would feel conflicted reading as an African American. Edana, or Dana as she is called, is unpacking the home she shares with her husband, Kevin, a white man, when she suddenly feels dizzy and opens her eyes to a new scene and an era that is not positive for people of color. She quickly discovers that she is pulled to that time period when Rufus, a young boy the first time she is transported, is having a serious issue. The firs trip occurs when Rufus almost drowns. When she is drawn back, she is there for an extended period of time. When she returns home, she finds she has only been gone minutes, sometimes hours. Her husband initially does not believe her until he holds her during her dizzy spell and is also transported. This book is simplistic in the writing style, but compelling in the story. Readers can tell that Butler has researched the topic and noted notable milestones and events. What I found jarring, especially in our contemporary time is how much some race relations have not changed. A person of color who speaks a certain way or is promoted in a business where upper management may be predominantly white may be accused of talking or "acting" white. This novel was written in the early 1970s. It is amazing the amount of code switching that African Americans had to do both as slaves and in modern times. Despite the difficult topic, I couldn't put this book down. There is an efficiency in Butler's writing style that keeps the pacing going. The twist of why Dana is drawn back to that time and to that particular person got me to interested to see if Dana would be taken back to that time again and again. I also wondered about the marriage with her husband, Kevin. The author dances around their relationship dynamic, but she doesn't focus on their relationship. It's the relationship between Dana and Rufus that is the main focus. As a reader, I found the logistics of Dana being pulled back into time a little problematic. No one knows why this started happening. I am a believer of the butterfly effect. I wondered why Dana wasn't concerned about changing parts of history, not just her personal history. African Americans often are distrustful of anything supernatural. When Dana appears and disappears often through the years -- for those during slavery time -- the slaves only have issues with her being friendly with the slave master's son, but not for her disappearing and reappearing. This should be required reading for all. Readers need to see what African Americans went through during the period, not just the physical abuse and assaults, but the lies and the methods they used to keep people in line and working, including separating families. I'm so glad I finally got to read this literary work. #CillasBookManiacs
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Great read
Truly a great read. Way ahead of her time. Some parts were incredibly hard to get through knowing there was a time in history where people were treated like this and the book is tame compared to true life. One piece of the plot bothers me. Makes no sense but I just went with it. Very interesting time travel novel.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com