Andrew Anthony: Parable of the Sower Final Post

     In my opinion I was a little let down at the end of the book, but only a little. The sequence of what happens in this last section builds up hope for something good to happen to Lauren and her group. They keep moving along north with very little trouble and things seem to be playing out in their favor. Lauren and Bankhole connect very closely. They find out that they both escaped walled in communities that were invaded and destroyed. Lauren also talks to him about Earthseed and tells him about here hyperempathy, which Bankhole ends up being very accepting of. Bankhole tells Lauren that he has land up north where his sister lives. He originally wants just Lauren to go with him, but Lauren convinces him to have everyone come with. Things are definitely looking up. But then, everything takes a turn for the worse when they reach Bankhole's land only to find the buildings burned and bones scattered everywhere. The police are of no help to him. In fact, they take Bankhole's money. The group then finds out that it is going to be difficult to find work in the surrounding towns. Lauren tries to put hope back into everyone by suggesting that they should start their own community on Bankhole's land by rebuilding and planting crops. It takes her a little bit but she convinces everyone to stay and help. They talk about getting dogs to protect them, having to have a night watch, and the fact that finding work will be difficult. But they have the idea that they can sell food either in the towns or along the highway. It seems that the group has a pretty good idea of how they are going to approach their lives. They also have a funeral for all of the family that they have all lost, giving them their each their own "closure."

     Now going back to what I had said in the beginning, I felt a little let down with how the book ended. The group finally turns things around again and have a plan for their community and Butler ends the book with Bankhole saying that he doesn't think they will succeed there and Lauren telling him that they have work to do. I mean it just leaves you sitting there with multiple possible scenarios that could happen to them, but as a reader I didn't feel very satisfied. I mean leaving the reader in suspense can be a great thing to do to end a book, but I feel that in a book like this were you have to expect the unexpected it didn't seem to like a fitting way to end the book.