Bookends: After waking from a serious injury, Shori very nearly eats someone just like she does in the beginning.

The guilty expect their friends to protect them from judgement.

Blatant Lies: These get tossed around the Ina Council like hot potatoes.

Beware the Nice Ones: Shori prefers to avoid unnecessary harm, but mess with her family and see what happens.

Ancient Astronauts: Some younger Ina believe this about their race, the end game being rediscovering interstellar travel and returning home.

Note that the title Fledgling was also used for a 2009 Liaden Universe novel by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller. As per her signature style, Butler takes a close look at the problematic aspects of the relationship between the Ina, humans, and the little living revolution named Shori. Then her father shows up, and she sets out on a quest to discover her lost past and make a future life for herself.įledgling is a 2005 science fiction vampire novel by Octavia Butler, lauded as a fresh take on the genre. Together they fall into all that entails, searching for her lost family, trying to figure out just exactly what her needs and abilities are, and how Wright fits in that.

Neither of them understand what draws them so inescapably to each other, but they give in to it, realizing together that the girl is some kind of vampire. She devours any living thing unlucky enough to be near her until she heals, and then she meets a human man named Wright. A little brown girl wakes up in a cave - hurt, confused, suffering from amnesia and literally starving out of her mind.

Octavia butler vampire