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The Worthing Chronicle (1983)

The Worthing Chronicle (1983)

Book Info

Series
Rating
3.84 of 5 Votes: 3
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ISBN
0441918107 (ISBN13: 9780441918102)
Language
English
Publisher
ace

About book The Worthing Chronicle (1983)

First I must say I normally like Orson Scott Card. However, this was a stretch and too much I must say as a reader - though as a writer it was marginally worthwhile. If you are a writer of SciFi the story is a great study of ideas and concepts. That said, the story is written about as removed from the action as humanly possible in almost a term paper like dissertation of ideas.That is, the "real time" story is about farming community going about their day to day tasks no longer protected from pain and the human condition by outside intervention. The "meat" of the story is about a boy scribe writing down a visitor's observations (1st indirection.) The visitor is telling his life story to a boy scribe. (2nd indirection.) In this story the visitor tells he is also a "servant" of another character. (3rd indirection.) And always the story is in the past. (5th indirection) This is not like the good use of "book ends" to ground the story in the present with the reader and yet there is a threat in the present (aka a ticking time bomb beneath the dining room table.) Throughout the story, it drifts in and out from the present to the already happened past - basically one huge flash back with some jarring context switches to remind you none of it is of consequence - well except whether they can farm ok in the present - not exactly science fiction, eh?If the characters were deep and interesting with deep seeded conflicts, it would be engaging at least at one level. But there is a lot of the boy reading the visitor's mind and explaining what he knows that the visitor knows about other character's in the past and why those distantly removed characters did something. It is like looking at the reflection in a window of a bathroom mirror, showing the living room where there is a TV showing the movie High Spirits. And then periodically someone steps in front of the mirror and describes what the characters in High Spirits are thinking. Ug. Double ug. Worse the "adult" in the story seems about as childish and inexperienced as the boy scribe. For someone who has lived everywhere and done everything he is incredibly preoccupied with little things and easily uneased by observations of the less experienced boy. Innocence can jar by showing you truths forgotten out of adaptation. That is not the case here. How this visitor made it to adulthood, much less to be the oldest human being requires too much story Kool-Aid drinking (aka suspension of belief.) So if I was reading this as a reader I think I would have shot myself in the head already (and given it two stars.) BUT some of the ideas are interesting and as a writer I found it did spark my imagination enough to get 3 stars.

This is a book that will make you take a good look at life. It tells the history of a planet, and how human failings and successes shape it. Without giving too much away, it makes you appreciate the bad times as defining moments. Without them, you wouldn't recognize the good.

Do You like book The Worthing Chronicle (1983)?

As interested I am in the reasoning behind the Fall of Adam and Eve, I never expected to find an explanation in a book of science fiction. Yet Orson Scott Card manages to both entertain and explain, and which line you follow is completely up to you. The overlaying view of the novel is pure entertainment, and it is quite possible to enjoy it without straining your mind. Not one but two stories are entwined, with the protagonist of one growing from the other. Normally I would critique a story told entirely in flashback, but although Jason’s story is told entirely in dreams, each one stands alone in terms of action. Each dream grips us, so we, too, are living the story. Lared, the second protagonist, dreams each dream, and he, too, is fully involved – more fully than even the reader, as he lives the action – and his understanding of his own world is changed. As the novel begins, Lared and his family are waking from a life of painlessness and ease. Unknown to them, a group of people – descendents of Jason – have been keeping the entire universe from both physical and emotional pain. Not only do people not hurt themselves, they also never experience grief, anger, or loss, for their memories and behavior are tampered with. Throughout the novel, Lared comes to understand why such a utopia is not ideal. Jason’s story is the reason behind Lared’s. Born with the ability to read minds, he is shunned and hunted, and finally leaves behind his home world to colonize a new one. Through a freak accident, he winds up with a city of people who have lost their memories and must start with the most primitive of societies. Such a world becomes a virtual Eden, where the people only know goodness and kindness. Yet Jason chooses to introduce the one person who retained his memories of how things used to be, and allows him to wreck havoc upon the society. In the process, good men become great. As an underlying theme, Card addresses the need for the Fall of mankind from the Garden of Eden. In a world that knows only good, he argues, no man can be great. No choice can be righteous. No one can be courageous. It is only when faced with evil that we can show our true strength of character. This is a wonderful novel, both in terms of pure entertainment and in terms of provoking great thought. Whichever level you read it at, you will be certain to close the book with a smile.
—Nola Redd

This work has all the telltale signs of a Card novel. It spans 15,000 years, revolves around a genius/superhuman, and is very mormon. Card lets his Christian values shine through in this book more than most. He condemns the Catholic Church, praises monogamy and creates a Jesus-like figure for a new universe. In it, Card answers the age-old philosophy question of the Happiness Box. He argues that true joy is different from happiness and that one only experiences joy if there is pain and suffering in the world, that there can be no humanity without suffering.
—Scott Shepard

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