Well, unlike most of the class it seems, I still don't have the same complaints about the writing. Perhaps I suspended some disbelief.
I wanted to comment on the discussion we had about alienness and whether the Jana'ata and Runa qualified as significantly "other" enough aliens. I still think it is next to impossible to truly depict absolute otherness. We simply wouldn't have a frame of reference to describe them much less interact. We'd probably blame the author for poor characterization or scoff at the descriptions. Therefore, the aliens in The Sparrow and Children of God I think were alien enough for the purposes of the books. God's other children would theoretically share resemblances to his known children. Each species had differences from each other and those on Rakhat shared some similarities that would come from evolving on the same planet. They had tails, different facial features, different body features, and different dominant senses. The cultures were different as well, though they did share common aspects with Earth history or societies. But again, I don't think that's necessarily bad. Depiction of an other that has no basis of comparison would make for a rather complicated first contact, don't you think? With absolutely no common points how would it be attempted? Luckily for the first Jesuit mission they had Emilio to pick up on the language parts quickly and act as a communicator.
I still don't really like Sofia in Children of God. Yes, she had a rather amazing life but she had some rather pointed blinders that affected her whole life and the life of her son. Perhaps he still would have gone off and she couldn't have prevented it even if they were closer, only two of their kind on the planet after all, but I think a lot of the excess violence against the Jana'ata that didn't want to fight anymore could have been avoided.
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I'll say again that it is possible to make a truly alien alien. You'd just have to write it either really obtusely or not bother with a useless second book that does nothing more than the first.
But obtusely wouldn't really get the point across, would it? It could be confused with strange language and the author could be accused of being lazy. I suppose we'll have to wait and see if it's possible.
I put forward the "obtusely" option not to suggest that it was a viable one. To create a "truly alien alien" in Russell's context would have required her to stop writing a useless second book.
I think the idea of creating a truly alien alien vs. one we can relate has to do with intention. Like I have said before I believe that sci-fi is often not necessarily some prediction of what would happen if we encountered an alien, but can be applied to contemporary or historical events and issues. If an author created a truly alien alien, then the focus would not be on topics like religion, gender, politics or other societal concepts, but on how people would have to shift their perspective in order to accommodate something that doesn’t fit into their cultural and societal conceptions.
I'm with Chris. The most essential factor in creating an alien alien is that it is so weird there are no words to describe it. Therefore, if you write an entire book dedicated to describing it, it does NOT fit the requirements. Summary: this book failed in its primary objective.
I definitely agree with Lena and although creating a truly alien alien is quite possible, it would not have helped the purpose of the book. I know I was one of the ones hoping that there were going to be at least slightly more alien aliens than this, I think to do that Russell would have had to write a very different book addressing some new topics, and any kept would have had to be handled much differently.
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