Imago

Octavia Butler

Completed 1/26/2019, Reviewed 1/27/2019

4 stars

I learned two new words for this book.  Bildungsroman-a novel dealing with one’s formative years or spiritual journey.  I also had to look up Imago-the final adult stage in the metamorphosis of an insect.  This final book of the Xenogenesis series is a bildungsroman of the first ooloi construct, that is, the first neuter gendered hybrid, or construct, of human and alien parents, as it metamorphosizes into an adult.  It has the same themes as the first two books, but is made much more personal, as this book is narrated in first person by the ooloi.  Once again, Butler shines in the details of the personalities of the aliens.  Her prose is stunning, not too flowery, not too sparse, and her dialogue is very believable. 

Jodahs is the child of Lilith and Tomas.  Being a juvenile construct, it has no sexual definition, but everything seems to point to it being a male.  Then Jodahs goes into metamorphosis and everyone is surprised that it is going to be an ooloi.  There weren’t supposed to be any ooloi constructs, but Jodahs seems to have happened by accident.  As an ooloi, it has great powers to heal itself and others, and Jodahs burns with the desire to help others.  Unfortunately, it also has the power to cause disease and malformity.  Ooloi go through two metamorphoses, one to become a sub-adult, and one to become a full adult.  While a sub-adult, Jodahs is dangerous.  So he is exiled from the community so as not to harm anyone.  Its family goes with it. 

In addition to the desire to heal, Jodahs also has a burning desire to mate with humans.  This would be difficult because most of the humans now on Earth have been forced-sterilized by the Oankali.  The fertile ones are already in familial relationships with Oankali.  However, in one of its lonely excursions from his family, Jodahs meets two humans who are descendants of people who were never captured by the Oankali.  Besides being fertile, they also have a debilitating genetic condition causing spots and tumors to grow on the body.  They are terrified of him, but he heals their condition and quickly seduces them.  As in the previous two books, the remainder of this book deals with the desire to bring all the remaining humans into the fold, to become parts of Oankali-human hybrid families, or go to the new Martian colony to live life fertile and away from the Oankali.

There is another definition for imago-an unconscious idealized mental image of someone.  There is also Imago therapy-a form of marriage therapy that takes a relationship approach rather than an individualistic one.  This latter definition became prominent in the late 80’s, and Butler probably didn’t know about it.  However, it is interesting because Jodahs’ main conflict is a relational one.  It craves a relationship with humans and solves their problems by being in relationship with them.  I don’t know if this is a stretch, but the connections really clicked in my head. 

It’s kind of hard to review this book because I feel like I’ve already reviewed it via the first two books.  What sets this book apart, though is the POV.  Jodahs is the most human-oriented construct so far and can teach the Oankali a lot about the humans.  It being first person perspective makes it real and immediate.  However, it is indicative of the final wiping out of the human race by mating with the last of the fertile humans, creating a new hybrid species.  But this presents the one plot hole I think I’ve found in the book.  If ooloi constructs are driven to mate with full humans, what happens to these ooloi when the last of the humans run out?  Can they mate with male and female constructs?  This question is never raised, but it was in the back of my mind through the whole book.

I give this book and this series four out of five stars.  It’s probably one of the most interesting and innovative alien invasion stories I’ve ever read.