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The Emergence Chronicles #1

Emergence

david r. palmer

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Candidia Maria Smith-Foster, an eleven-year-old girl, is unaware that she's a Homo post hominem, mankind's next evolutionary step.

With international relations rapidly deteriorating, Candy's father, publicly a small-town pathologist but secretly a government biowarfare expert, is called to Washington. Candy remains at home.

The following day a worldwide attack, featuring a bionuclear plague, wipes out virtually all of humanity (i.e., Homo sapiens). With her pet bird Terry, she survives the attack in the shelter beneath their house. Emerging three months later, she learns of her genetic heritage and sets off to search for others of her kind.

291 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published October 1,1984
Series
The Emergence Chronicles
Literary awards
hugo award, locus award, philip k. dick award, compton crook award, 

This edition

Format
291 pages, Mass Market Paperback
Published
January 1, 1984 by Bantam Books
ISBN
9780553245011
ASIN
0553245015
Language
English

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About the author

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david r. palmer

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Community Reviews

Rating(4.1 / 5.0, 100 votes)
5 stars
35(35%)
4 stars
36(36%)
3 stars
29(29%)
2 stars
0(0%)
1 stars
0(0%)
100 reviews All reviews
Profile Image for Kimberly .
BabyGirl06301
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 16,2025
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Having read many recommendations for this book I was looking forward to reading it. The story was a good post-apocalyptic scenario but I found the writing style too robotic and difficult to follow, improving with sequences of dialogue. I nearly gave up on this one, glad I didn't but won't be reading the sequel.
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Mako
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 16,2025
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Interesting and off-beat. Found ending bit rushed. Little dated. Sequel?
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mewmiyu
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 16,2025
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last 50 or so pages dragged on (lots of science-y terms) but ultimately really enjoyed it
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Itkovian
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 16,2025
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Good

The language feels of its time so hoping the sequel is a little more up to date. Great story, well paced and a truly wonderful protagonist.

However..

Candy's frequent musings on sexual relations were uncomfortable reading at times though and didn't sit well with me. She seems to think aged 11, that as soon as her body has reached sexual maturity her role as either breeder or pleasure giver to adult men is fair enough given its the apocalypse. Even with the adoption of her (good looking) 'big sisters' towards the end this view is never challenged. It really needs to be. And the line about making sure the old retired astronauts who were helping her defuse the bomb would ' die with smiles on their faces' had she just been a little older, made me want to be sick in my mouth.

Yeah, if it wasn't for all the slightly depressing sexistunderage sex stuff i'd have given it 5 stars.
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naruto_nutty
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 16,2025
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Other, more enthusiastic reviews are I suspect based mainly on nostalgia, but this is as engaging as reading Heinlein's space-cadet books as an adult. The writing is moderately engaging in a naive, old-sci-fi kind of way, but heavily tempered by the preposterous premises, here just beginning with the super-human 11yr-old protagonist.

I suppose if I'd read it as a pre-teen it would've been another fun, ego-centric super-hero romp. At this point though, well after that stage, I found it a bit painful.
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Tumerking
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 16,2025
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I read this book many, many years ago--probably when it came out in 1985--and was fascinated by the premise of the story, particularly that those who survived the nuclear holocaust ending WWIII all had grandparents (great-grandparents?) who caught the 1918 flu and survived because the disease had mutated their genes and their [great]grandchildren were the next stage of humans, Homo post hominem. I also enjoyed the fact that the story was told through her diary, which she kept in Pitman shorthand (although the book spelled out the abbreviations used in Pitman in Roman characters). It was sort of gimmicky, but I didn't actually find it hard to follow after a couple of pages.

Given the effects of COVID on society (and how poorly people accepted the changes to their lives that were necessary to stop or slow the spread, compared to the way the 1918 flu was handled) and the latest invasion of Ukraine by Russia, this story has been on my mind recently.

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NadiaSusana
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 16,2025
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Having unpacked the books we couldn't do without, I picked up one of my all-time favorites, David Palmer's EMERGENCE, to re-read it. As I've no doubt said before, re-reading old favorites is fraught with tension, because what if they don't hold up?

EMERGENCE holds up. It holds up in spades. There are some moments of unintentional amusement and cognitive dissonance, particularly regarding microfiche libraries and Russians as The Bad Guys(TM), but even if you put the book in an absolutely modern context there's an argument for the microfiche, so it was just mildly amusing.

Other than that, though, that is still a *great* story. While reading it I kept having little jolts of remembering What Happened Later--not so much Next as Later--but it was nearly like reading it again for the first time despite that. I had every bit as much emotional investment--possibly more, because I'm a big old softie these days--as I ever did reading it previously, which is pretty wonderful.

Also, Betsy Mitchell was one of the editors on it, which made me laugh out loud when I read the acknowledgements. I suspect that book must have been one of the very first places I encountered Betsy's name, thus setting me up for a lifetime of wanting to work with her. :)
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WanderingRonin
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 16,2025
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Excellent story, frustrating delivery

The story is excellent but it's written in an unrelenting first person shorthand. I would have enjoyed this much more if I didn't have to mentally fill in all the words missing.

This is written from the point of view of an 11 year old super super genius. I would have liked to read more about the world and what was happening, but it's restricted to an, albeit super smart, 11 year old point of view.

The handling of sexuality is a bit disturbing, given that the main character is 11. There isn't any explicit sex, but a fair amount of gore.

The writer seems to think that the super smart would find using 'all the words' tedious. As a higher than average smart person, I disagree because my goal has always been to be understood clearly. But I'm sure I wouldn't qualify as super super smart.

It's worth reading because the story is interesting, but I'm not sure how easy to read it would be for most people. Not that you have to be smart to read it, just that it's somewhat tedious.
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