The Wall Around Eden

by Joan Slonczewski

Book Overview

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Mass Market Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 038071177X
• ISBN13: 9780380711772
• Release Date: January 1990
• Publisher: Avon Books
• Length: 288 Pages
• Weight: 0.95 lbs.

Customer Reviews

Where there is life...

is there hope? The Earth is recovering from a atomic war that was carried out twenty years earlier. And right after the missiles exploded the aliens came and protected some of the towns and cities with the Walls. The Walls kept the people in, while they watched the rest of the world die. The Walls kept them in but allowed the radiation in. But some babies lived and some animals and plants survived (inside the Wall). Now humans must try to keep living, planning for a future, a future for their children and mankind. To have a future, they must understand their past and also come to understand the aliens. Did they start the war? Why did they come and build the Walls? What plans do they hace for mankind or are they just collecting what is left of mankind for a zoo? A must for any sci-fi library.

Life Goes On

This story was well enough written, but it lacked some pizzazz or something. It told the story of a community after the nuclear holocaust, people are protected by some advanced species. The proctectors can only communicate in pictures and, therfore, not very complex ideas. The story revolves around a young girl, coming of age, who is rebellious, but can not really find anything to rebel against. The people are well enough off and have freedom within the confines of their community, but they cannot go beyond a certain distant away. The be all to end all is that she gets to know their captors better and grows to see them as protectors. I think there is an allogory to pregnancy and birth in here also, but I did not look or think too hard about it. It is a pretty good story.

Very Good and Unconventional Science Fiction

This book is an interesting combination of pacifist-Quaker tract, coming of age novel, and post-holocaust science fiction. The story is set in a near future after a nuclear holocaust-nuclear winter. There are small colonies of survivors in communities maintained by enigmatic aliens, whom some survivors suspect of triggering the holocaust. The main character is a young woman coming to maturity in a community of survivors in Pennsylvania, a community where many survivors are Quakers. The point of the story is the necessity of pacifism and Quaker respect for life beliefs. The characterization is convincing and the author's depiction of this future is equally convincing. The quality of writing is very good.