- Mass Market Paperback: 208 pages
- Publisher: Warner Books; Reprint edition (31 Dec 1995)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0446362816
- ISBN-13: 978-0446362818
- Product Dimensions: 17.3 x 10.7 x 1.5 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,417,871 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Description
Product Description
The combined mind--force of a telepathic race, patternist thoughts can destroy, heal, rule. For the strongest mind commands the entire pattern and all within. Now the son of the Patternmaster craves this ultimate power, He has murdered or enslaved every threat to his ambition----except one. In the wild, mutant--infested hills, a young apprentice must be hunted down and destroyed because he is the tyrant's equal....and the Pattermaster's other son.
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First Sentence
The sun had not been up long enough to burn off the cold dampness of morning when Teray and Iray left their dormitory room at Redhill School for the last time. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
The sun had not been up long enough to burn off the cold dampness of morning when Teray and Iray left their dormitory room at Redhill School for the last time. Read the first page
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Octavia Butler is a black American writer who, in her later novels, manages to successfully combine feminism, Black issues and SF into some brilliant work.
‘Patternmaster’ is her first novel, and though it doesn’t have the power and depth of her later work it’s an excellent exercise in creating a realistic society in which these post-humans have evolved advanced paranormal powers.
Homo Superior is most often depicted as a powerful but benign species, above the petty squabbling of us mere sapiens, and mostly used as a device with which to hold a mirror to ourselves.
Butler’s Patternists have no advanced moral sensibilities to accompany their formidable powers and are locked not only into the ‘Pattern’ of linked psychic energy which binds them but also a hierarchical slave culture based on mental power.
The system is brutal, controlled from the summit by the dying Rayal while his children battle murderously to succeed him.
The novel is set in some unspecified future and suffers in this respect from no real contact with our present.
Butler’s subsequent novels, including the far superior prequels, ‘Wild Seed’ and ‘Mind of My Mind’ are set either in the past or in contemporary USA, and go far deeper into examining the dynamics of power between individuals. The issue of slavery recurs again and again in Butler’s work, as it does here when Teray – one of two powerful candidates for the position of Patternmaster – is forced into a choice between accepting a benign form of slavery to his brother or losing his wife.
Understandably perhaps, the richest characterisations are those of the women, who are for the most part frustrated and exasperated by the patriarchal system which has evolved within the constraints of The Pattern, but nonetheless attempt to find ways to use the system to their advantage.
It’s a short, deceptively simple novel, but one which still manages to explore the human capacity for exploiting its own species, a theme which is later more extensively developed in ‘Wild Seed’ and indeed, in most of her work since.
‘Patternmaster’ is her first novel, and though it doesn’t have the power and depth of her later work it’s an excellent exercise in creating a realistic society in which these post-humans have evolved advanced paranormal powers.
Homo Superior is most often depicted as a powerful but benign species, above the petty squabbling of us mere sapiens, and mostly used as a device with which to hold a mirror to ourselves.
Butler’s Patternists have no advanced moral sensibilities to accompany their formidable powers and are locked not only into the ‘Pattern’ of linked psychic energy which binds them but also a hierarchical slave culture based on mental power.
The system is brutal, controlled from the summit by the dying Rayal while his children battle murderously to succeed him.
The novel is set in some unspecified future and suffers in this respect from no real contact with our present.
Butler’s subsequent novels, including the far superior prequels, ‘Wild Seed’ and ‘Mind of My Mind’ are set either in the past or in contemporary USA, and go far deeper into examining the dynamics of power between individuals. The issue of slavery recurs again and again in Butler’s work, as it does here when Teray – one of two powerful candidates for the position of Patternmaster – is forced into a choice between accepting a benign form of slavery to his brother or losing his wife.
Understandably perhaps, the richest characterisations are those of the women, who are for the most part frustrated and exasperated by the patriarchal system which has evolved within the constraints of The Pattern, but nonetheless attempt to find ways to use the system to their advantage.
It’s a short, deceptively simple novel, but one which still manages to explore the human capacity for exploiting its own species, a theme which is later more extensively developed in ‘Wild Seed’ and indeed, in most of her work since.
Format:Hardcover
Perhaps not her best, but I enjoyed this novel and have re-read it several times. The writing is lean and elegant, so carefully written that it can be perused many times with profit. Her notions of human speciation - and her merging with the themes of the mutated Clayarks - are masterfully covered and expanded, as are her notions of the power of the mind.
The battle at the center of the novel - the passage of power over a new mass mind of mutants - is taut and frightening, even as she must explain the unusual powers that are being wielded. Once again, her characters are full, first-rate creations that live on in the readers' mind afterword.
The battle at the center of the novel - the passage of power over a new mass mind of mutants - is taut and frightening, even as she must explain the unusual powers that are being wielded. Once again, her characters are full, first-rate creations that live on in the readers' mind afterword.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
20 reviews
20 of 21 people found the following review helpful
Taut little coming of age novel
22 April 2000
Format:Mass Market Paperback
The coming of age novel was a golden age mainstay. Butler's work here is reminiscent of the novellae of golden age writers. As we might have been in an Asimov, Heinlein or Silverberg, we are placed in midstream in a future history constructed as an extension of other Butler novels. Butler novels typically feature the dilemma of being human in a dystopian setting--this novel is no exception. This "future earth", inhabited by one group of humanoids with enhanced mental powers, and another group of intelligent nomads infected by an alien virus, is easy to wrap one's imagination around even if one is not familiar with the Butlerverse. Butler also spares us the detailed rehash of "prior future history to the present future history" that could weigh down (and no doubt increase word counts in Astounding Magazine of serializations of) the golden age novels. Instead,we have all of Butler's strengths at play--a direct, intelligent writing style, an ability to convey character in spare, plausible phrases, and plotting which is neither heavy science nor pure fantasy, but has a unique fictive plausibility allowing an easy "buy-in" by the reader. The book also has the factors that can make a Butler slightly off-putting--casual violence, a chilling soul-lessness permeating the characters, and an abiding sense of otherness. If you've always wanted to try Butler, but want to do one in an afternoon to see if you like her, this is the one to try. I read this during a 3 hour interval, and found myself never bored nor particularly desirous of a longer stay in this particular world than need be. Butler is the real thing--and this is not a bad introduction to her.
17 of 18 people found the following review helpful
Continuing Mary's Legacy - The Patternist World
19 July 1997
Format:Mass Market Paperback
The pattern established in the late 20th century by Mary, descendant of Doro, has continued into the far-flung future. Society is in three sects: The Patternists who are the ruling class. The Mutes -- humans who lack a psychic talent or ability, and the Clayarks, diseased half-human creatures -- who are regarded by the Patternists as mindless savages.
The story follows the two contenders for the right to take over the Pattern from the existing master of the Pattern who lies dying. Coransee, the elder, is brother to the younger but will not permit that to stop him from obliterating any obstacle between him and the ruling of the Pattern.
The most disturbing thing about the book is that plain, ordinary humans -- men and women who are neither diseased nor part of the pattern -- are spoken of with pity and treated little better than housepets.
The Clayarks turn out to be surprisingly sympathetic for disease-generated once-human mutations. They are displayed as easily as human as anyone else on the world which bears only passing resemblance to the Earth that we still recognized from Mind of my Mind.
The ending is only slightly surprising. But Butler's pervasive and unsettling theme is that, one way or another, at least in her world view--the human race will only survive if it is dramatically changed into something else. Better or worse, she leaves to the discretion of her readers
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Great conclusion to a great series
10 May 2006
Format:Mass Market Paperback
After reading Wild Seed, the first book in the series, I had to read Mind of Mind (Book 2) and finally, The Patternmaster. This book is the 3rd of a series and it makes much more sense if you read the previous two.
In The Patternmaster, Butler finishes the story of the Pattern which began in Mind of My Mind. I would NOT recommend this book if you have not read the previous two. Too many questions are unanswered, it would only be confusing.
I would recommend the first novel, "Wild Seed," followed by the second, "Mind of My Mind." "Clay's Ark" is a side novel, but it explains the origin of the Clayarks and part of the reason Earth is so messed up. If you read them prior to "The Patternmaster," things will be clearer.
To Schwinghammer - The reason it seemed that she didn't tell you where the novel took place was because she'd already done so in the previous books. I think you'll find Wild Seed interesting and entertaining; Mind of My Mind is the set up for The Patternmaster.
In The Patternmaster, Butler finishes the story of the Pattern which began in Mind of My Mind. I would NOT recommend this book if you have not read the previous two. Too many questions are unanswered, it would only be confusing.
I would recommend the first novel, "Wild Seed," followed by the second, "Mind of My Mind." "Clay's Ark" is a side novel, but it explains the origin of the Clayarks and part of the reason Earth is so messed up. If you read them prior to "The Patternmaster," things will be clearer.
To Schwinghammer - The reason it seemed that she didn't tell you where the novel took place was because she'd already done so in the previous books. I think you'll find Wild Seed interesting and entertaining; Mind of My Mind is the set up for The Patternmaster.
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