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Title: The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell ISBN: 0-449-91255-8 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 08 September, 1997 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.91 (364 reviews)
Rating: 2
Summary: I did not like the book
Comment: I really enjoyed the first 100 pages - I thought the characters were well developed and the story line was OK. I enjoyed the book until our heroes found out about the mysterious civilization - the singers in Proxima Centaurs. From this point on the book was full of technical inconsistencies and story gaps and it was very annoying to continue. I somehow digested the fact that the alien life was found around the closest star to our Sun (very convenient, but well it happens), I also closed my eyes to some technical inconsistencies, but I said: "OK, the book does not focus on the technical side of the problem but on the emotional", so I was still willing to continue. The final drop in my frustration was the fact that after this great discovery the Jesuits are the one that sponsor the mission, not any Space agency, not the military, not the government - this is the first mission to another planet ever in Human history, this is the first alien civilization found ever in Human history. And instead of sending experienced people suitable for such pioneering mission they send a priest, a medical doctor and few scientists without any training? Not a surprise that the mission was a disaster... I can go on and on, but I will stop at this point. The bottom line is that I am very unsatisfied with the book.
Rating: 4
Summary: Thought-provoking anthropological sci-fi
Comment: ...the writing in the first half of "The Sparrow" is somewhat disappointing. (It's the only reason I can't give the book 5 stars, although it probably still deserves it.) Russell set herself an enormous task by telling the story in two timelines with two sets of fairly complex characters and relationships to establish within the first 150 pages. The forward-moving timeline that recalls the discovery of Rakhat and establishes the histories and relationships of the expedition members is especially problematic. The dialogue and character development are overly earnest; the constant humorous/sarcastic banter comes off as very forced at times, as well as corny. There was a point, about a third of the way through the book, when I began to wonder if I was going to finish it.
Fortunately, the story's second timeline is much stronger, almost from the beginning. By describing the history and culture of the Jesuits and releasing details of the mission's terrible aftermath in little bits and pieces, Russell cleverly builds suspense and a sense of dread. Knowing everything that they did about "first contact," what could have happened to cause the deaths of the crew and the torture of Emilio Sandoz? How did everything go so horribly wrong? Where was God in all of this? By the middle of the book, the two timelines are of equal strength -- the characters and relationships are all established, the dialogue genuine and thoughtful, the sense of wonder and fear on Rakhat burning like wildfire. At this point, I couldn't put the book down.
I guess the moral of this review is STAY WITH IT. "The Sparrow" is a book filled to the rim with compassion for and insight into the spiritual and emotional lives of people everywhere. There are scenes of extraordinary beauty that will bring tears to your eyes, and they are worth waiting for. (As bad as the early dialogue was in places, I was shocked to discover how poetic Russell's writing really is most of the time.)
There are also horrific scenes that may give you nightmares or make you question the nature of human faith in God. "The Sparrow" is a darkly disturbing cautionary tale about getting caught up in one's own sense of purpose, about assigning meaning to events and calling it God's Will. People of "blind faith" who see God as a short-order cook waiting to serve up whatever their little individual egos pray for will NOT like this book, nor will people who are sexually squeemish or anthropologically challenged. However, if you appreciate great literary sci-fi in the tradition of Ursula Le Guin or Doris Lessing, you'll probably love "The Sparrow."
Rating: 4
Summary: A very good, though slightly flawed, book
Comment: Reviewed by Richard Gray
http://www.rich-gray.com
Father Emilio Sandoz, a Jesuit Priest, is a master linguist who has been ordered by his superiors from place to place, learning languages and helping the poor and unfortunate for the glory of his God. When he is allowed to return to his home town in Arecibo Puerto Rico he befriends Anne Rice, a physician; her engineer husband, George; a young astronomer, Jimmy Quinn; and a former child prostitute turned computer expert, Sofia Mendez. On August 3rd, 2019 a radio transmission is picked up at the Arecibo dish from intelligent life on another planet. Jimmy Quinn is the first to hear it, and, against protocol, Jimmy's closets friends are next.
From the instant Sandoz hears the people of Rakhat singing from 4 light-years away he is convinced in the need to meet them for the glory of his God. He and his Jesuit order stop at nothing to put together the first mission to the planet and the crew ncludes himself, three other Jesuits, and his skilled friends from Arecibo.
Despite initial success, the mission goes horribly wrong. When a government led mission arrive they find Sandoz with brutally mangled hands, living as a prostitute, and standing over the body of an alien child he had just murdered. Sandoz returns to earth, disgraced, and it is up to his Jesuit superiors to try and find out what happened.
The book is written from the point of view of two different time periods, alternating from chapter to chapter. One follows Sandoz as a broken man being questioned about the mission, and the other shows how the mission unfolded and what really happened. This approach to telling the story works perfectly for the plot and everything from chapter to chapter is masterfully paced.
The reader is immediately hooked by the question of what made Sandoz go from a devoted priest that believes his God is lovingly guiding his life, to a man who is physically broken and has come to hate God. As the details of the mission are revealed the answer to that question may shock the reader.
The writers strength is in creating her characters, their motivations, and in creating the Rakhat landscape and culture. The interaction between the two intelligent species on Rakhat is well thought out. Jimmy Quinn is the perfect characterization of a physics graduate student, and Anne Rice and her husband remind me of people I have met in academia. Though I am no expert on Jesuits, Jesuits have apparently embraced Russell's characterization of them as being accurate.
This is all around a beautiful book and among the books that I've read in the last year this is one of my favorite. However, to be honest, despite how much I liked it, there are a number of flaws throughout the book that I think potential readers should be made aware of. These problems include a few spots were the writing becomes unclear, some technical problems in the plot, and that her characters' dialogue can sometimes be a bit annoying. I'll explain below.
There are a few spots here and there that aren't written as well as the rest of the book and you'll have to re-read to figure out what just happened. There are only a few of these instances that I noticed, and they only last a paragraph or two, but at least one of them came at an important point in the plot. However, the book is good enough that even really picky readers will probably forgive these bad spells and gladly keep going.
There are also technology related problems in the plot that will annoy scientists or people with technical training. For example, Sophia Mendez is supposed to be some fabulously expert computer programmer called a "vulture". "Vultures" supposedly can write computer programs so well that they can replace people at their jobs, and people tend to get nervous whenever a Vulture is hired to study what they do. However, I've done some computer programming in my time, and there is absolutely nothing that Sofia does that regular old hackers like myself couldn't do. It is particularly annoying that Sophia gets called in to write a program that can do Jimmy Quinn's job. As a physics graduate student myself, I can tell you that Jimmy would have written that program himself a long, long time ago without Sofia's help. As far as other technical issues are concerned, I think she handles the Special Relativity well enough in the story, but there are other ideas she puts forth that I don't think are actually physically possible. But, then again, I guess this is science fiction, and in comparison to a Star Trek or a Star Wars novel the science in here is solid
Sometimes the Character's dialogue, though I think it is realistic, can get a little annoying. Russell has gone out of her way to try and give her characters interesting backgrounds, accents and dialects. She succeeds. However, reading a passage with a realistic portrayal of a Texan spouting folksy sayings is just as a bad as sitting on a bus next to a real Texan spouting folksy sayings. You may want to strangle them before you get to your stop, and in the book you might want to pop a cork in the character D.W.. Also, when the characters are chatting and joking around with one another it sometimes reads like a transcript of a conversation from a dinner party you weren't invited to. Annoying.
Despite the flaws I just mentioned, this is still a very good book. As Russell revealed more and more about Father Sandoz and what happened to him I really couldn't put it down. I read the last hundred or so pages in one day, and added the sequel "Children of God" to my list of books to eventually read.
Richard Gray
http://www.rich-gray.com
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Title: Children of God by Mary Doria Russell ISBN: 044900483X Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 02 February, 1999 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: Calculating God by Robert J. Sawyer ISBN: 0812580354 Publisher: Tor Science Fiction Pub. Date: 15 July, 2001 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: Out of the Girls' Room and Into the Night : Stories by Thisbe Nissen ISBN: 038572053X Publisher: Anchor Pub. Date: 17 October, 2000 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
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Title: The Palm at the End of the Mind : Selected Poems and a Play by Holly Stevens, Wallace Stevens ISBN: 0679724451 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 19 February, 1990 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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Title: The Terminal Experiment by Robert J. Sawyer ISBN: 0061053104 Publisher: Eos Pub. Date: 01 May, 1995 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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