Kindred Paperback - 2004
by Octavia Butler
This 25th anniversary edition, about a modern black woman who is snatched away to the antebellum South, celebrates a classic work with "much to say about love, hate, slavery, and racial dilemmas, then and now" ("Los Angeles Herald Examiner").
About this book
Butler's best-selling novel Kindred explores what would happen if a woman with 20th-century sensibility was transported back to an antebellum plantation. Dana is a black woman writer in the 1970s. As she's celebrating her birthday with her new husband, she is transported back in time to the antebellum South. There Dana saves a drowning white man, Rufus, son of the plantation owner, where she finds herself enslaved. She realized that she was summoned through time to save him, and it happens again and again, each time transport getting harder and longer as she tries to protect her ancestral line to save herself.
Summary
Reader reviews for Kindred
Review summary
Reviewers largely praised Kindred for its unflinching portrayal of slavery through a spare time-travel frame, calling it tense, absorbing, and morally layered. Dana’s perspective and her conflicted ties to Rufus prompted wide discussion of complicity, survival, and privilege, and many noted the book’s continued relevance for classrooms and contemporary debate. Readers were split on genre: the unexplained time travel led some to see it as historical fiction more than science fiction. Common critiques included occasionally stilted dialogue, uneven character depth, and a finale that can feel abrupt, though the emotional impact and momentum carried most readers through.
Readers say this book is:
grippingintensethought-provokingmorally complexvisceralrelevantunsentimentaldisturbingstilted dialoguerushed endingWrite a review for this book
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From the publisher
First edition identification
Doubleday published the first edition of Kindred in 1979. Jacket illustration by Larry Schwinger. First editions are scarce, and have ‘First Edition’ printed on the copyright page.
Details
- Title Kindred
- Author Octavia Butler
- Binding Paperback
- Edition [ Edition: Repri
- Pages 287
- Volumes 1
- Language ENG
- Publisher Beacon Press, Boston, Massachusetts, U.s.a. Bruce Springsteen
- Publication date 2004-02-01
- Features Bibliography, Table of Contents
- ISBN 9780807083697 / 0807083690
- Weight 0.66 lbs (0.30 kg)
- Dimensions 8.01 x 5.3 x 0.8 in (20.35 x 13.46 x 2.03 cm)
- Reading level 580
-
Themes
- Cultural Region: Southern California
- Cultural Region: Western U.S.
- Cultural Region: West Coast
- Ethnic Orientation: African American
- Geographic Orientation: California
- Locality: Los Angeles-Long Beach, CA
- Sex & Gender: Feminine
- Category Fiction - Science Fiction
- Library of Congress subjects Los Angeles (Calif.), Science fiction
- Library of Congress Catalogue Number 2003062862
- Dewey Decimal Code FIC
Media reviews
Citations
- Ebony, 04/01/2004, Page 26
About the author
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by Octavia E. Butler
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