Children of God - Mary Doria Russell

The book ‘Children of God is the sequel to Mary Doria Russell's award winning first novel, ‘The Sparrow’. In this we take up once again with Father Emilio Sandoz, the only survivor of a doomed expedition to a nearby planet, set in the not-to-distant future. In that first novel, a team of Jesuits and others set sail to the nearby star system of Alpha Centauri to discover the source of unexplained radio transmissions which sounded quite a lot like a new kind of music. The star-crossed trip ended disastrously for the expedition team, and the only survivor of that group was Sandoz, brought back to earth.

Most of the characters from the first novel have died (in this novel we discover how a few of the missing people from the first expedition met their fates), and due to the effects of near-light-speed travel, many decades have passed on earth while Father Emilio is still relatively young.

There are political crises on earth, including a crisis in the church, and there seems to be an urgent need for yet another expedition to Rakhat. Politics on earth has made the reaching out to another planet a priority for different teams in different ways. Within the church, the reader discovers that the Jesuits are under a papal restriction akin to excommunication (something that has periodically happened in the life of the church), but the leader of the Jesuits, who is one of Sandoz’s friends from his early days, is a powerful figure who cannot be easily dismissed by the Pope.

In the interim period between the Sandoz expedition and return, there were several attempted journeys to Rakhat, all of which failed. The church hierarchy decides that the only 'successful' trip was that of Father Emilio, and thus decides (largely without his consent) to send him off again. This becomes a point of agreement between the powers within and outside of the Jesuits, although the crisis there is unresolved as the new expedition sets forth.

Sandoz is considered in some ways a blessed figure – the only expeditions to Rakhat that ever returned had one thing in common, that of Sandoz.

At the same time, Rakhat has undergone a dramatic change, brought about in part by the arrival of the strangers, but also due to the political schemings of members of the dominant race, the Jana'ata. The gentle but subjugated race of Runa, always larger in number in the population, begin to realise their oppressive situation, aided by renegade Jana'ata, and a civil war breaks loose. Into this situation the human expedition re-enters the scene on Rakhat.

This story completes many of the unfinished details from ‘The Sparrow'. By filling in the blanks while also carrying the narrative forward, Russell's rather dark picture of the nature of God in the universe (as enacted by the creatures on earth and elsewhere) becomes a little lighter, a little more just, a little less doomed. There is, however, no answer to the personal injustices, to Father Emilio's abuse both at the hands of the Jana'ata and the Jesuit order.

Indeed, Sandoz has renounced his priestly orders back on earth, and even taken a wife (who brings with her a step-daughter for Sandoz). However, the hierarchy of the church does not relinquish its control of Sandoz so easily, and he is sent away on this new journey much against his will.

Russell’s development of the political situations on Rakhat are reminiscent of the late civil war and post-war reconstruction periods in various historical periods on earth. There is a lot of confusion, a lot of readjustment and realignment, and problems for both races, who have to achieve a new condominium in the civilisation on the planet. Much in the way that European exploration and colonisation often had unintended and unexpected results for the local populations (and problems that the explorers and colonisers were ill-equipped to solve), the situation on Rakhat ends up in a disaster for the ‘old order’, but does end on a sense of hope for the ‘new world order’.

Russell's development of the characters, both human and alien, deepens and broadens in this second novel; her imaginative history of the alien cultures is quite stunning, and her treatment of the strengths and weakness in human character insightful.

Russell does a good job at elevating some minor characters from the first novel into major or pivotal roles in the sequel. She resists introducing too many new characters, and the continuity of the plot between the two books is very well done. The situations are plausible even if fantastic at times, and Russell’s power of description, already rather good in the ‘The Sparrow’, is further refined in positive directions in the follow-on stories.

Russell still keeps a rather sombre and dark aspect to the overall narrative strand. There is a sense of existential angst mixed into the theology, even as the theological narratives are never the focal point. Life always proceeds in unexpected directions, and while the overall sense of hope for the community is finally achieved, both on the earth and on Rakhat, there is still a sense of the lack of justice for many individuals, including Sandoz.

Read ‘The Sparrow’ and ‘Children of God’ back-to-back if at all possible. Together, these novels represent a very interesting creation of a new world not so distant in time, space or concept from our own.