The Tuloriad (Legacy of the Aldenata)
by John Ringo, Tom Kratman
List Price:
Our Price: $9.94
You Save: $16.06 (62%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $0.21 (click here)
Category: Book
See more book details and other editions
Book Summary Information
Author: John Ringo, Tom KratmanEdition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2009-10-06
ISBN: 1439133042
Number of pages: 400
Publisher: Baen
Book Reviews of The Tuloriad (Legacy of the Aldenata)
Book Review: On one hand, original plot, awesome aliens. On the other hand, one little problem.
Summary: 4 Stars
I enjoyed the Tuloriad on a number of levels. It was a sympathetic exodus and rebuilding story... about the man-eating alien invaders.
The Posleen/Legacy of the Aldenata series starts with man-eating alien centaurs who are well-nigh unstoppable roaming the Earth and eating people. The Posleen, as they are called, have very little mercy or empathy or culture of their own. How could beings like that have a society let alone reach the stars? In the later books, culmnating in The Tuloriad, Ringo and Kratman go back and look at the earlier books and say, basically, no they couldn't, that's not natural. Something changed them and made them that way.
This leads to the central question of the Tuloriad: Who did it to them, why, and can the Posleen change themselves again, this time into something better?
Defeated alien general Tulo'stenaloor survives the mutually disastrous invasion of Earth to limp off into exile with a remnant population of his people in search of a more sustainable, less destructive way of life. Along the way on their space journey of nearly Homeric proportions, the Posleen learn that their vanished gods, the Aldenata, were not gods at all but a fellow alien species that tinkered with their genetics and destroyed their culture in order to use them as perfect killing machines. How best can they recover from this? Do they seek to reclaim past glories and paste together a culture made up of best guesses and approximations, imitate the other species they see around them, or make up something new?
Meanwhile, Father Dwyer and his sentient Artificial Intelligence wife Sally are leading a ship full of missionaries from Earth's various major religions on a mission to bring the civilizing influences of faith to the species that almost wiped out humanity. The motley crew includes the eccentric Reverend Guanomarioch, a fervent Posleen convert to Christianity, eager to save the souls of his fellows.
The Tuloriad is in many ways a story about religion, what people want from it and what it can do for society. Frankly, that doesn't bother me in the least. This is xenoanthropological science fiction far more than it is space opera, and in human societies religion has played a very powerful role in shaping how people see themselves and the world around them - it makes sense that it might be the same for aliens.
Is it a little funky about gender at times? Well, yes. There are a few digs about how feminism would take a fatal blow and a period of polygyny would be absolutely necessary in the wake of an alien invasion that killed a huge percentage of the Earth's population and a disproportionate percentage of the men.
Apparently the idea that more women = a more female-dominated society was not a possibility that occurred to the authors, and nor did the idea that actually, in a population-depleted male-deprived environment, same sex relationships make perfect sense and are actually very socially responsible if you allow for turkey basters. But that didn't particularly bother or surprise me because, quite frankly, they're straight male science fiction authors. That's about what I would expect and it was easy enough to handwave away as what a Catholic priest born in the early twentieth century (the viewpoint character during those segments)really would think. By those standards, it's positively liberal!
No, while some might need to be warned for that, what actually bothered me - though not enough to ruin the book for me - was this:
Background, the Posleen are a one-gendered, one-sexed species, universally and functionally hermaphroditic. They do, however, vary as to sentience. About 95% of them are mere wild animals, no smarter than the average hyena, and beyond that, there are many who are about as smart as a chimpanzee. Only a very few are fully sentient, but those who are are fully capable of language, speech, and all the things that you and I can do. It is perfectly natural and indeed expected for them to mate between intelligence levels - it has no impact one way or the other on the possible intelligence of the offspring.
The Reverend Guanomarioch got lonely and decided to buy a chimp-level mate off of Ebay (long story). So far, so good. Then he (and they all do use he in human languages, as a convenience) decided that as his single life-long mate and co-parent was clearly his wife and decided to refer to "her" exclusively with female pronouns - something Posleen do not usually do, choosing rather to use he or it.
This is perhaps not surprising or offensive coming from an alien who A) a fervent convert to evangelical Christianity and B) has only an alien outsider's understanding of human gender or relationships. It's the humans (both fictional and authorial) who have me headdesking.
No one sees anything weird about this! None of the humans, men or women, comment even in private on the dubious terminology or implications of this. Of course the one with animal-level intelligence is "the wife". Of course she should be referred to as she! She does an admirable job of tending their offspring and having sex with Guanomarioch, what else does a wife or female need to do?
Oh, John Ringo, no.
Summary of The Tuloriad (Legacy of the Aldenata)
The Enemy of My Enemy . . .Of the once innumerable battle clans of the Posleen only a handful survive. And that on the sufferance of a group of despised Indowy and Himmit. Plucked from the maelstrom on Earth they are cast out into the eternal blackness of the stars with only a slightly insane Indowy and a computer virus to guide them.
What follows is a trail of tears and remembrance as the Posleen retrace the footsteps of their ancestors in a search for their homeworld. A search to determine if the Posleen posess the one thing no Human would give them credit for: A soul.
Returned to their beginnings, the question remains: Is there a new path for the Tular Posleen?
Literature & Fiction Books
Book Subjects
- Arts & Photography
- Biographies & Memoirs
- Business & Investing
- Children's Books
- Comics & Graphic Novels
- Computers & Internet
- Cooking, Food & Wine
- Entertainment
- Gay & Lesbian
- Health, Mind & Body
- History
- Home & Garden
- Horror
- Law
- Literature & Fiction
- Mystery & Thrillers
- Nonfiction
- Outdoors & Nature
- Parenting & Families
- Professional & Technical
- Reference
- Religion & Spirituality
- Romance
- Science
- Science Fiction & Fantasy
- Sports
- Teens
- Travel
Most talked about in Literature & Fiction Books
Little Womenby Louisa May Alcott
Scribner; Published: 1986-06-30; Paperback; Book
Best price: $3.49
Price in other shops:
The Killing Groundby JACK HIGGINS
HARPERCOLLINS PUBLISHERS LTD; Published: 2007; Hardcover; Book
Saving Fish from Drowningby Amy Tan
4th Estate; Published: 2005; Paperback; Book
Life Expectancyby Dean Koontz
Harpercollins Pb; Published: 2005-08-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.00
Constant Princessby Philippa Gregory
Touchstone/Simon & Schuster; Published: 2005; Hardcover; Book
Wolf of the Plains (Conqueror, Book 1)by Conn Iggulden
Harper; Published: 2007; Paperback; Book
Saharaby Clive Cussler
Harper Collins Pb; Published: 2005-03-21; Paperback; Book
Perelandra (Cosmic Trilogy)by C. S. Lewis
Voyager; Published: 2005-11; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.64
Price in other shops:
The Lord Of The Rings: Part 2 The Two Towersby J. R. R. Tolkien
Harper Collins Publishers; Published: 2001; Paperback; Book
Red Marsby Kim Stanley Robinson
Trafalgar Square; Published: 2001-06; Paperback; Book
Similar Books and other products
Watch on the Rhine (Posleen War Series #7)by John Ringo, Tom Kratman
Baen; Published: 2005-08-02; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $2.90
Price in other shops:
Hell's Faire (Posleen War Series #3)by John Ringo
Baen; Published: 2003-05-01; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $8.11
Price in other shops:
Cally's War (Posleen War Series #4)by John Ringo, Julie Cochrane
Baen First Edition; Published: 2004-10-05; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $3.88
Price in other shops:
Citadelby John Ringo
Baen; Published: 2011-01-04; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $10.55
Price in other shops:
The Hot Gate: Troy Rising IIIby John Ringo
Baen; Published: 2011-05-03; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $13.79
Price in other shops:
Yellow Eyes (Posleen War Series #8)by John Ringo, Tom Kratman
Baen; Published: 2007-04-03; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $5.39
Price in other shops:
Sister Time (Posleen War Series #9)by John Ringo, Julie Cochrane
Baen; Published: 2007-12-04; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $3.32
Price in other shops:
Honor of the Clan (Legacy of the Aldenata)by John Ringo, Julie Cochrane
Baen; Published: 2009-01-08; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $3.46
Price in other shops:
Eye of the Storm (Posleen War)by John Ringo
Baen; Published: 2009-07-07; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $1.98
Price in other shops:
Eye of the Storm (Posleen War)by John Ringo
Baen; Published: 2010-05-25; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $4.41
Price in other shops: