Daughter of Eden

Before you continue reading this, please remember that this is the second book in a series. My review of the first book can be found here.

In the interest of full disclosure, I did not love the first book. The childish language used with adult topics just did not appeal to me. I understand and can appreciate it as  device. It is really clever and certainly adds something to the evolution of the culture, but I just could not get into it. Many other people loved it. The story itself was fine, I just did not like the dialect that was created. I enjoyed the plot well enough, but I could have loved it if the dialogue was a bit different. It seems strange, but I find myself disagreeing with almost every other review I read on this second book. I think I may be the only person who like this better than the first book. Not only did I like it better, I actually enjoyed it significantly more. The characters and world were both very well developed in both, however I felt that this was a much more mature book.

Now that we got that out of the way, on to the main course: Mother of Eden by Chris Beckett. The first thought I had when I put the book down was, as I said earlier, “Wow, I liked this much better than the first book” though I was not exactly sure why.  Mother of Eden picks up a few generation after the events of Dark Eden.  None the characters from the first novel are still around, however the main characters are now the subjects of their own mythology, much like Gela and Tommy became in the prior story. The world is much more spread out now since the events of the previous novel as a result of John Redlantern, and different cultures have emerged. There is still heavy striation between Johnfolk and Davidfolk, though there is some trading between them. There also seem to be some outliers, those who wish to be outside of the divisions or have chosen to follow a path other than the main two. That is where this book begins.

Starlight Brookling comes from a small fishing Island where the people identify themselves as Jeff’s followers, an independent offshoot of John’s followers. They prefer to live simple, basic lives under the radar of the other factions on Eden. While this lifestyle works to the contentment of most of the island’s inhabitants, Starlight is too adventurous to be confined. Starlight convinces her uncle, as well as her friend Angie, to take a trip to the mainland. Not everyone is in favor of this, but when she sets her mind to something, Starlight is fairly persistent. The mainland shows these simple island folk a whole different culture with strange dress, real metal, advanced ships, and odd accents. What they do not know is that Starlight’s life is about to become more different than she could ever comprehend.

Without giving too much of the story away, Starlight finds herself in a land far more distant than she originally planned. Thrown into a situation that she can hardly comprehend, she must adapt quickly to strange customs, not just to fit in, but to survive. This other land is a stark contrast to the simple island. There is a much more civilized and advanced culture with political structure there. It seems that the people here have really evolved their civilization. The cost, however, seems so be that the darker and more manipulative nature of humankind emerge under these conditions. Now, faced with the recovered ring of Gela herself, Starlight must balance a responsibility to her new people, her conscience, and her life.

I really think Chris Beckett did a fantastic job in his follow up novel. The character development is really great in this book. I felt that it was pretty good in Dark Eden as well, but it felt stronger in Mother of Eden. The world building was also much richer and more in depth. With the emergence of new subcultures, it fleshed the world out even more. He re-imagined a familiar fantasy trope and made it his own in a new and unique world. If you like the first novel, this is a must read. If you didn’t love the first novel, I personally think this is a redeeming next installation. The dialect that is used still bugs me a bit, but with the richer story, less so. I gave it 4 stars for that reason. I almost passed it because of my general indifference to the first, but I am really glad that I gave it a chance.

The third and, according to the author, final book in the Dark Eden series is currently in the works. It will be titled Daughter of Eden (<-check the link) and will feature Starlight’s friend Angie living among the Davidfolk. No release date has been announced yet, but I will check it out as soon as I ave the opportunity.

Disclaimer: I receive this review copy through the LibraryThing Early Reviewers program.

Dark Eden was first published in 2012 which soon earned its author Chris Beckett a British Science Fiction Association Award  nomination for Best Novel that same year. It then went on to win Beckett the  Arthur C. Clarke Award for Best Novel. In 2013 Broadway Books, an imprint of Crown Publishing, acquired the US rights. It was published here earlier this year. I received a review copy for this US publication in exchange for a fair review.

This novel is a science fiction and dystopian story. The story takes place on a planet, or more likely planetoid, called Eden. I say planetoid for two reasons; first, there does not seem to be a central mass or solar system that it orbits. There is no natural sun or close by star. Secondly, the planet appears to be fairly small. Several generations ago a few people from Earth took off into the unknown, followed by police, and landed on Eden. While some attempted to return home, two of them stayed, waiting for the possibility of Earth to return to get them. In the meantime, the two who stayed began their own family and started populating their new home. Jump to present day in the book, there are over 500 people living on Eden, all in the one area where their ancestors first landed. These humans are living on a truly alien planet. Their light and heat come from trees with hot sap pumping through them. The animals somewhat resemble the creatures of earth, yet are wholly different.

The people make the best of what they can in their little piece of this alien planet. The whole community of every human living there is called Family, while subgroups have sprung up named mostly after things around them such as Redlantern and Spiketree. These groups have their own areas within Family. The society is governed by both the group leaders as well as a council presiding over all groups. They have lived this way since the first two, Tommy and Angela, taught them.

One teen, John Redlantern, sees things a bit differently. This main character does not understand why things have not changed. He feels that the traditions are stifling them and not allowing them to grow and reach the level of those who came from Earth. John and small group of friends wish to expand Family. Traditionalists are not happy with this idea and controversy spreads. The story switches tracks from idealism to adventure on this still mostly unknown world.

There is a whole cast of unique individuals. Beckett give you a good taste of all of them, though not in major depth. I can say that while I understood most of the characters, I cannot say that I really liked any of them. Not that I did not like how the author wrote them, I did not like their personalities. I suppose that says they were developed enough to have unlikable characteristics. I started out liking John and the way he saw the world. I later found that I very much disliked him. I began to see past his altruism and saw something else. I also really liked Tina Spiketree at first, but I stopped being able to. Other characters were meant to be hated, and you do in fact hate them as you read.  While the characters were developed, I just personally have trouble getting fully immersed in a story where there is nobody to really relate to.

Another interesting thing was the language. They spoke English, since Tommy ad Angela did. They know of London, Brooklyn, television, electricity, and so on. There was no way to truly understand these things, but they had vague ideas. They however spoke about it in a manner similar to when you are teaching a three year old and they say things how they hear them. The names and words come out in hybrid English/baby talk. That is how a lot of the words in the story were. It makes sense. Slang develops in all cultures and vowel shifts, etc. It is as if you are teaching a child to say things, however you do not correct them, so their mispronunciations are passed down for generations. It worked in the story so it did not bother me most of the time. Occasionally I wanted to yell at the characters to pronounce the words properly, but that is just me. I will even point things like that out at the office.

The story was fairly interesting. The concept of stranded earthlings making their home on a distant and strange alien world is a great science fiction concept. It felt like a Lord of the Flies meets Lost in Space. OK, two classics there so it is not really a negative statement, but I felt that it could have been taken so much farther. I realize that this is only the first book in a series, with the next one slated for release in 2015, I believe. The first story did not jump out at me and make me want to continue though. I tend to have bad luck with award winning novels. Maybe I expect too much going in, or maybe I just have a completely different taste that award committees, but I tend to not love these lauded novels as much as I want to.

The book was not bad, 3/5 in my eyes. I did not love it, but I did not hate it. It seemed right in my wheelhouse, but just did not live up to expectations. Again, Dark Eden was an OK book, but I felt it was too lackluster considering all of the praise. I wanted to love it, instead I just did not mind it.