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Book: The chrysalids
Published way back in 1958, The Chrysalids, by John Wyndham, is a pioneer in the world of science fiction, and even today its story remains fresh and original. Mankind has just been wiped out by a devastating nuclear war leaving only pockets of survivors scattered all over the globe, who too are separated by vast expanses of radioactive ‘badlands’ to know too much about each other.
However, each community has its own ideas of what the nuclear war was and what they are left to do. One community thinks that it was a punishment from God and that the resulting birth defects are the sign of the devil interfering with God’s creation. So they take it on themselves to kill or remove all human children who are ‘far from perfect’.
David, the protagonist of the story learns at a young age the perils of being different when his childhood friend is captured and sent to the ‘Fringes’ where all the mutated people live because she has six toes, and when his aunt has to give up her third baby because she is unable to produce a ‘human’ child. However, David too has an abnormality, one that thankfully his people are unable to see because it’s actually a gift.
He, along with a handful of other children scattered across his country, is able to communicate ideas to each other by simply ‘speaking pictures’ with their minds. Read on to find how his unique ability leads him to make startling discoveries about the human condition.
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