Is Kindred a sci-fi novel? Well, not in the traditional sense. Admittedly, time travel plays a role. But it’s as a tool to engage the reader by looking at history through the eyes of a modern protagonist. You won’t find any pseudo scientific explanations for why or how time travel works and there is limited internal logic and consistency. That isn’t the point of the novel.
Dana is a young African-American woman who lives in California in modern times. “Modern times” means the 1970s, but besides from a few details (they had to look up information in the library instead of googling) it didn’t feel overly dated. One day, Dana gets dizzy and when she recovers, she finds herself on a plantation in Maryland, 1815, where black people are slaves and white people are masters. Here she meets Rufus, son of the plantation owner, who turns out to be one of her ancestors. The two of them develop a complex relationship, loaded with moral dilemmas. Whilst dependent on each other for survival, they are also master and slave.
The time travel trope amplifies the juxtaposition of present and past. In the present time Dana is a writer. She has a white husband and of course she has her freedom. I thought it was clever and impactful to let us experience history through Dana’s eyes.
A negative consequence of building up the novel around time travel is a somewhat repetitive pattern. Every part starts with Dana being called back to the past, because Rufus’ life is in danger and finishes with another specific event, which brings her back. In between, she learns what it takes to survive in a world, where black people are whipped or have their children traded away on the whim of their masters.
The short interludes which take place in the present time are uninteresting. They mainly serve to progress the story to a different period. A short moment in the present may represent a decade in the past.
Kindred is plot-driven and I didn’t find the characters particularly deep. Rufus was amongst the more memorable ones. He could be kind, when he got his way, but cruel when he didn’t. He behaved irrationally and often threw tantrums. But he felt realistic. With a brutal father whose violence extended to his child and with the prevailing norms for white people, I could see how he had become the man he was.
The slave Alice, Dana’s other ancestor, had an interesting storyline. All the way through she struggled with the same dilemma, which has been described in books about concentration camps. As a favourite of Rufus’ she could make life so much easier for herself by being nice to him. On the other hand, she would betray every principle, she’d ever believed in.
Generally, I found the descriptions of the dynamics between (and within) various groups in the community compelling and, I suspect, accurate.
Whilst utterly readable, Kindred didn’t quite live up to my high expectations, though. Besides from the repetitive structure and lack of character depth, I didn’t love the writing and the ending fell flat. However, as a portrayal of life as a slave, this novel gets top marks. 3 1/2 stars.
Title: Kindred [1979] Author: Octavia E. Butler Format: Audiobook, narrated by Kim Staunton Genre: Historical Fiction, Sci-fi
Lovely Book review. Enjoyed reading it.
Thanks, glad you enjoyed it. 🙂
I liked the bok and like you, I think it’s likely an accurate portrayal, but I felt some of it was too “facile”–not sure that’s the word I’m looking for.
I think, I know what you mean. I guess she had to compromise somehow. It’s difficult to write a fast-paced page-turner whilst digging deep into all the issues and adding lots of nuance.
A great review, and you’ve interested me. Not sure though, whether it’s done enough to move the book into my TBR pile (that’s because of what you’ve said by by the way, not how you’ve said it. I’m not setting out to be mildly insulting!)
Thanks Margaret. I think maybe I went into this with the wrong expectations. If I had gone into this expecting the writing style from a fast-paced thriller combined with interesting historical background, then I think my expectations would have been met. I was judging it more on its literary merits, which may not be fair to this kind of novel. Still, I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it.
Great review! I’ve hardly read any Butler but I’d like to try more, including this one!
Thanks Callum! I like to try more of her books as well. I am curious about the Parable of the Sower and now I know what to expect from her writing style, I may enjoy the next one more.
This was my first book by Butler and I really enjoyed it. I didn’t really have expectations more curiosity.
I did enjoy it, but perhaps I had too high expectations after having seen several bloggers and booktubers raving about it.
The historical aspect on slavery is probably excellent, but I never felt I wanted to read it, and your excellent review confirms me in my choice
Glad to have confirmed your choice! I thought it had many merits, but definitely flaws as well.
Despite you only giving this book 3 1/2 stars I really enjoyed your review and have added the book to my list. I do enjoy time travelling stories and am interested in the historical aspects of the story.
Thanks Rose, I would definitely recommend, even if I didn’t love it unconditionally. Actually, I don’t think 3 1/2 stars is bad. 3 stars and above means, I’m glad I read the book. It might help to have the right expectations. If you are aware that the focus isn’t on beautiful writing and that some depth and nuance may have been given up in order to provide a relatively fast-paced page-turner, then you (hopefully) won’t be disappointed.
You’ve made an interesting point. I’m racking my brains to think of any books that are both beautifully written and are also fast-paced page-turners and can’t think of any.
Me neither. I am sure there is an exception though (there always is… 😊).
Great review as always and you caught me out this time because I was assuming that you had really loved this. It’s long been a book I’ve wanted to read and nothing you’ve said has put me off. On the contrary, I appreciate the pointers on where the weaknesses lie.
Thanks Sandra. I expected to love this one as well, but I still count it as a win, because I did really enjoy it and I’m glad to finally have read Butler novel. It probably is helpful to have realistic expectations and I may enjoy my next Butler more, because I now know what her writing style is like. Next time I will focus more on the concepts and ideas and won’t expect highly “literary” writing or nuanced characterisations.
As I started reading this review, I thought “Hm.. I’ve read this”, but I don’t think I actually have. There is some other book out there which is VERY similar, although a bit more contemporary. I always think time-travel can be difficult to write well without being repetitive, and sounds like this was no exception. It does sound like something I’d be interested in reading if only from the slavery historical perspective tho. Thanks for your review!
I’ve seen it being compared to Outlander, but I don’t know if that is a valid parallel, since I am not familiar with the latter. It’s been a while since I’ve read a time travel book, but I don’t remember having been bothered by repetitiveness before. Perhaps, I’ve become a more critical reader over the years? Anyway, I still thought it was a good book, which I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend.
Pity it didn’t quite blow you away but it still sounds interesting and she’s another of the many writers I keep intending to try one of these days. I can see how the time travel element would allow her to make modern judgements in a way straight historical fiction wouldn’t, but I suspect it would still annoy me.
That’s how I felt about Butler. I’d heard so much about her and some of her work are considered modern sci-fi classics. I am glad to finally have read one of her books. The repetitiveness of the the time travel definitely annoyed me, but afterwards I wondered if I have become too critical for my own good? Maybe I would have enjoyed it more if I had stopped my overly analytical brain from picking on all the small details I didn’t like… Fundamentally, it’s definitely a good story and interesting concept.
Fantastic thoughts on this beloved classic. It’s one that’s on my TBR and I really appreciated your criticisms on this one. It’s good to know that the only sci-fi element here is the time travel and that these characters aren’t really the draw of the story but the story itself is were the goldmine is at! Thanks for sharing! 😀
P.S. I wanted to let you know that (for various and maybe obvious reasons) I’m transitioning to a new blog that would be mine alone as of today (later today actually, when I post my monthly wrap-up) and I wanted to let you know beforehand. Since I cherished our interactions for the past years, I’d love it if you’d follow me there going forward (blog isn’t up yet though). You can decide on remaining a follower of Bookidote but, on my end, for a couple of weeks, I might only cross-post my stuff until I’m ready to drop Bookidote completely. 😀
Thanks Lashaan. Even if my rating was moderate, I would still recommend Kindred. First of all, it is a page turner. Secondly, it tells an important story in a compelling way. And thirdly, I really admire Octavia Butler and think it’s amazing what she has achieved.
Oh wow, congratulations with your new blog, of course I will follow! 😊
Yeah I guess I want to read it for its slave portrayal and how unique it is to get out of that. I have yet to read Butler but still want to. I’m glad for your review of it.
Even if I didn’t love this one, I am still interested in reading more Butler. I find her an interesting author and I believe some of her other books (Parable of the Sower for instance) include more ideas, concepts and speculative elements, which I normally enjoy.
I’ve been contemplating on reading this book. But after reading your review, I might just skip it 🙂 Great, honest review, Stargazer! I especially loved your post title 🙂
I guess it is kind of a classic and I am definitely glad to have read it. Maybe my expectations were too high to begin with. Haha, I’m glad you noticed the title. A blogger mentioned, it’s better to write a creative / different title instead of the usual “Book Review: Kindred by xxx”. Not sure it really makes a difference though.