Children Of God (Black Swan original) [Paperback]

Mary Doria Russell's first novel, the award-winning The Sparrow, proved that any stock sf theme can be renewed by hard thought and good writing. The first human expedition to the alien world of Rakhat ends in complex disaster; the only known survivor, the Jesuit linguist Emilio Sandoz, is brought back raped, mutilated and an emotional wreck--only by telling his story of complex cultural misunderstandings does he even gradually regain his sanity, if not his faith. Rakhat is a world with two intelligent species, not one--and the gifted biologists and musicians whose radio messages attracted Earth's attention not only enslave, but eat, the likable efficient peasants that humans first contacted. Sandoz is shanghaied back, by a coalition of the Church and the Mafia, only to find the situation even more complicated--he was not, after all, the only survivor. Sophie, infuriated by massacres, has started a revolution - and when prey determine to be rid of their predators, revolution becomes genocide. This is a powerful novel of religion, politics and bad choices--it is a sequel which intelligently undercuts and revises assumptions its predecessor imposed on us; like its predecessor, it is one of the key sf novels of the 90s. --Roz Kaveney

The sequel to Mary Doria Russell’s powerful and haunting debut, The Sparrow.

From the acclaimed author of The Sparrow comes a new, extraordinarily imaginative SF novel which continues the powerful, moving story of Emilio Sandoz, the charismatic Jesuit priest who led the well-intentioned but catastrophic mission to the distant planet of Rakhat, and journeyed to the furthest reaches of the human soul.

Now, in Children of God, Father Emilio Sanchoz returns and – against his will – is forced to continue his quest for the meaning, if any, of God’s plan. Dazzlingly imaginative, philosophically provocative and immeasurably entertaining, Children of God is a must-read for fans of The Sparrow, and a startlingly fresh adventure for newcomers to Mary Doria Russell’s special literary magic.

'Not for the Society. Not for Holy Mother Church. Nevertheless, for yourself and for God, you must go back,' Gelasius III told Emilio Sandoz with a terrifying joyful certainty. 'God is waiting for you, in the ruins…'

The sole survivor of the original catastrophic mission to the planet Rakhat, Father Emilio Sandoz has barely begun to recover from his horrific physical and psychological wounds when he is summoned by the Vatican to take part in a second expedition to Alpha Centauri. With his objections and his fears summarily ignored, it seems Sandoz is powerless to escape his past or the future.

Against his will, he returns to Rakhat to be confronted by a world writhing in the agonizing throes of revolutionary change. And as ghosts from his past rise up to haunt him, opening old scars, Emilio finds himself struggling to make sense of a moral universe whose boundaries now reach beyond our solar system - and whose future lies with children born amongst the stars.

Strikingly original, richly plotted, replete with memorable characters and bursting with humanity and humour, Children of God continues the remarkable journey to a distant planet and to the centre of the human soul that began with The Sparrow and confirms Mary Doria Russell as one of the most innovative, entertaining and philosophically provocative novelists writing today.

Mary Doria Russell is a former anatomist, has studied six languages, trained as a paleoanthropologist and is the author of scientific papers on subjects as various as bone biology and cannibalism. Her first novel, The Sparrow, won the 1996 James Tiptree Award, the 1998 BSFA Award and the 1998 Arthur C. Clarke Award and she has also won the Cleveland Arts Council Prize for Literature and the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer of Science Fiction. Her second novel, Children of God, is the sequel to The Sparrow. Mary Doria Russell lives in Cleveland, Ohio, with her husband and their son.