science fiction annotation: He, She and It

He, She and It
By Marge Piercy

Genre: Science fiction, Dystopian fiction
Publication date: 1991
Number of pages: 446

Synopsis:

The year is 2059, and the nuclear holocaust of 2017 and subsequent worldwide famines have drastically altered Earth’s environment and human life on the planet. In a conditioned ‘multi’ corporation-zone in the Nebraska desert, twenty-eight year old Shira Shipman has just lost custody of her two-year old son to her spiteful ex-husband, who has abruptly left with their son for a two-year assignment on a platform away from Earth. Deep in despair, she leaves her hard-earned tech job at the multi and returns to her hometown of Tikva, a Jewish freetown, to live with Malka, the grandmother who raised her. Back in her childhood home, she works alongside Avram, a family friend, on the socialization of Yod, a human-like cyborg covertly and illegally created by Avram and Malka to protect the Tikva community. In the midst of her efforts to mold Yod into a convincing human, Shira is amazed by by his/its capacity to develop human-like expression and emotion, and before long she becomes involved in a sexual and romantic relationship with the cyborg.

Weaved into this story is a parallel narrative, told by Malka as a bedtime story to Yod, linking the 21st century creation of this beloved cyborg protector to the story of Jewish folklore wherein Polish rabbi Judah Loew creates the golem of Prague to protect the Jewish ghetto from the Easter pogroms at the turn of the 17th century.


Appeal:

Both storylines are character-driven, no small feat for one narrative that creates a convincing love story between a woman and a cyborg and another narrative that brings to life a well-known story of Jewish mysticism. The narratives are punctuated by dramatic events and heart-wrenching moments, but the stories move at a leisurely pace, slowly building the characters and their complex relationships by meandering through stories of their pasts. The novel carries a stimulating and thought-provoking tone as the reader is moved to consider philosophical concepts of creation and human identity alongside themes of gender, love, and family.


Read-alikes:

The Handmaid’s Tale, by Margaret Atwood
“In a future world where the birth rate has declined, fertile women are rounded up, indoctrinated as "handmaids," and forced to bear children to prominent men.” (NoveList)

The Sparrow, by Mary Doria Russell
“The sole survivor of a crew sent to explore a new planet, Jesuit priest Emilio Sandoz discovers an alien civilization that raises questions about the very essence of humanity, an encounter that leads Sandoz to a public inquisition and the destruction of his faith.” (NoveList)

Doomsday Book (Oxford Time Travel #1), by Connie Willis
“For Kivrin, preparing an on-site study of one of the deadliest eras in humanity's history was as simple as receiving inoculations against the diseases of the fourteenth century and inventing an alibi for a woman traveling alone. For her instructors in the twenty-first century, it meant painstaking calculations and careful monitoring of the rendezvous location where Kivrin would be received.
But a crisis strangely linking past and future strands Kivrin in a bygone age as her fellows try desperately to rescue her. In a time of superstition and fear, Kivrin--barely of age herself--finds she has become an unlikely angel of hope during one of history's darkest hours.” (Goodreads)