A Door Into Ocean

ConversesSomeone explain it to me...

Afegeix-te a LibraryThing per participar.

A Door Into Ocean

Aquest tema està marcat com "inactiu": L'últim missatge és de fa més de 90 dies. Podeu revifar-lo enviant una resposta.

1beatles1964
Editat: ag. 14, 2008, 1:13 pm

A Door Into Ocean was the very firsy book I ever read by Joan Slonczewski. I know Spinel was a male and had gone to the Planet Shora to help them out because Shora was going to be invaded by an Army of Soldiers. Shora is a Planet of all females and they are called the Sharers of Shora and are Lifeshapers. I have wondered why Spinel didn't let them genetically change him into one of them. Since they all looked down on Spinel as being some kind of a freak or mutant because he was a male.

The Planet Shora is an Ocean and they all have to live on rafts. I thought that if I had been Spinel I would've let them genetically alter me to become one of them. You know the old saying goes, "If you can't beat them, join them". So to me it would've made sense for Spinel to become like the rest of the Sharers of Shora. Does anyone have any thoughts, theories or explanations why Spinel didn't let them do this to him? I'm just curious as to why he didn't bother to do this.

beatles1964

2beatles1964
Editat: ag. 15, 2008, 2:43 pm

I know that A Door Into Ocean was Joan Slonczewski's second book that she wrote and is also the one that is responsible for making her famous and a household name. And that it is also a Feminist Science Fiction book too. I am curious to find out what was the first Joan Slonczewski book everyone else here ever read.

Did you care for the book A Door Into Ocean? Since this is the only book of hers that I have ever read I can't judge this book against some of the other's she has written. So how does this compare to her other books? Doe anyone have some recommendations for me as to what is the next Joan Slonczewski book I should read?

beatles1964

3sussabmax
abr. 29, 2009, 5:25 pm

You wrote this a long time ago, but I will answer...

I think he didn't have them change him for two reasons.

1) By the time you are an adult, your self-image is pretty firmly set. Adults generally view their gender as a fundamental part of who they are. A person may feel that there is a wide variety of ways that someone of their gender could or should behave, but they don't believe that the actual gender should ever be changed. Or, looking at it from another perspective, think of transgendered people. They also have a strong identity with a particular gender and even biological reality does not convince them they should switch that identity. If that self-idnetity is so strong that they are willing to go through massive surgery and hormone treatment to make their body align with their identity, wouldn't someone who had a strong identity that matched their biological reality feel strongly about NOT changing their body?

2) I don't think he thought he would be on Shora forever.

This is the only Slonczewski I have read, too. It is hard for me to find her books in mainstream stores, and I try to avoid all of those interesting used bookstores when I can. I am out of shelf space already!

4beatles1964
Editat: maig 4, 2009, 2:03 pm

I just found out there are three more volumes in Joan Slonczewski's Elysium Cycle about Shora which I'll have to look into trying to find to complete the series. I had been wondering if there were any more novels about Shora.

I'm wondering how these other books fare against A Door into Ocean. Any opinions? I understand Daughter of Elysium is set a couple hundred years later in the future.

Daughter of Elysium
The Children Star
Brain Plague

Beatles1964

5beatles1964
maig 5, 2009, 7:08 am

sussabmax now that you mention it what you say does make sense to me as to why he didn't have them change him however, if I was Spinel I think I still would've asked them to change me to become one of them at least then I would fit in with everyone else there and wouldn't be considered some kind of a Male freak or worse. So to me it would've made a lot of sense to go through the process to become one of the Sharers.

Beatles1964