Book: Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler, a graphic novel adaptation by Damian Duffy and John Jennings
Genre: Graphic novel
Publisher: Abrams ComicArts
Publication date: 2020

Source: Hardback borrowed from the library

Summary: Lauren Oya Olamina, 15 years old, grapples in a world where her cul-de-sac has been walled-in for protection. They leave their neighborhood rarely.

People travel by bicycle because fuel is expensive or unavailable. Lauren has a condition called hyperempathy syndrome where she feels other people’s pain at a time when pain surrounds her neighborhood. Pain surrounds her neighborhood, giving her even more discomfort than the others when she leaves the safety of the neighborhood walls.

Lauren sees that the situation is worsening and works, with no support from people around her, on both the philosophical and practical mindsets that will help her survive. She writes her philosophy/religious tenets in a book called Earthseed.

Thoughts: Parable of the Sower was our March selection for the book club where we mostly read books about race in America. Of course, we were expected to read the original novel by Octavia Butler, but I did that a few years ago. So, I checked out this graphic novel, instead.

I definitely got the high points of the plot from this version. I could tell because I rarely felt like the group discussion was about something that wasn’t covered in this book.

One of our big discussion points was how prescient this feels. I remember that, as well, when I read it the first time in 2019. Octavia Butler published Parable of the Sower in 1993. The book is set from 2024 to 2027, thirty-some years into her future. And, yet, she saw enough of what was happening with the climate and the economy and in the violence of the government and business toward ordinary people, that she wrote something that feels like it might be right around the corner in our future.

The graphic novel is powerful with inky drawings and dark colors suiting the feel and mood of the story.

Appeal: Parable of the Sower is a good book for anyone who worries about our future. It’s not exactly hopeful, but the Earthseed philosophy and the journey taken by Lauren can prepare us, a little, if the future turns out even more dystopian than it is now.