The world is no longer controlled by what we would call normal humans. These humans have left their glorious days in the past, and the large and once bustling cities full of skyscrapers are now ancient ruins that mark what once was.Instead, the world is dominated by a specific subset of humans who possess psychic powers. These people are called the Patternists, and they use their mind-control abilities to subdue other creatures and bend them to their will.One person, the Patternmaster, a man named Rayal, is superior to all of them, having control over this psychic net. However, the Patternmaster is dying, which means that one of his hundreds of children will have to replace him. This story follows two brothers who are the most powerful of these children and stand the highest chance of becoming the next Patternmaster. The older brother, Coransee, who already has a lot of power and status, is the obvious candidate, but when his younger brother, Teray, reveals himself as a potential threat, Coransee does everything in his power to subdue him, but Teray is not one to be easily broken.

This is Octavia Butler's debut novel, and interestingly enough, this book, despite being the first book of the Patternmaster series to be published, is chronologically the final book in the story. That's why a lot of people actually start off with the book that comes first chronologically, and end up reading this book at the end. I chose not to do this because I knew that if I would have been inevitably disappointed, since as a debut novel, I was sure this book would have been underwhelming compared to the other ones, where Octavia Butler had more experience as a writer. I'm definitely glad I made this choice. Reading this as the first book in the series, despite it being the last one chronologically, does a good job in building the world Octavia Butler wants us to explore. In this universe, social laws are different. They seem to be an extreme form of ancient Turkish/Arab/oriental culture, where each Patternist owns a "House", where he reigns supreme, and has the right to sleep with any woman (and technically, also man) who is part of that House. Everyone in that house would exist to serve him. As for the "normal" humans who don't possess these psychic powers, they're classified as "Mutes" and are treated as vulnerable servants to the Patternists. We also have another group of people, called the Clayarks, who seem to be a sort of mutated subspecies of humans, who don't have the same powers the Patternists do, but have enhanced combat abilities. The Clayarks are nomadic and are openly hostile to the Patternists, and seek to infect them with a sort of disease that they carry, which the Patternists are vulnerable to.

As we can see, the world is a nicely complex one. The themes of power dynamics and slavery seem to be strongly present in this book.We see this first and foremost between the two brothers, Coransee and Teray. Coransee is obviously threatened by Teray's potential, and tries to break him in every way possible, through brute psychic and physical force, and through social humiliation. Coransee doesn't hesitate to use his social privileges to bring Teray down, such as becoming sexually intimate with Teray's love interests, with or without their consent.Teray is faced with the difficult choice of either becoming Coransee's slave, having limited freedom and being forced to follow his orders and live a demeaning life, or to live a free life, even becoming the future owner of Coransee's House when Coransee takes his spot as the new Patternmaster, with the cost of giving Coransee full mental control over him. Coransee claims that he would never truly interfere in Teray's life, and would only do so if Teray ever chose to rebel against him. This leads to another freedom related theme in this book. Is life worth living, when one knows that they are not truly free, and are simply allowed to exercise their liberties? Teray fights against this notion, and prefers risking his own life and the lives of the people he cares for, instead of submitting to that fate. The relationship between the Patternists and the Mutes also falls under the umbrella of this theme. It is frowned upon to use violence against Mutes since they are considered to be fragile and defenseless against the Patternists, but should we see this as an act of kindness? Why submit the Mutes to a life of servitude in the first place? One can easily see how this type of thinking is present in our non-fictitious world.

The atmosphere is bleak and cynical, and although the book doesn't really have much graphic violence, it does have psychological power struggles that can weigh heavy on the reader.The dirty power games Coransee plays against Teray can be potentially difficult to read, and the abuse of power always present in the book can be unnerving. This isn't an action packed plot heavy book, but a contemplative and atmospheric one.So if one's in the mood to dive into this atmosphere and contemplate the social issues brought up here, this book is worth the read. I recommend people to start with this book, because based on many people's reviews, they were disappointed with this installment after having read the books that are chronologically set before this one. I can understand why, because I found the ending to be a bit underwhelming and rushed, but it didn't bother me because this book didn't serve as the series finale for me, but if it had, I would have been greatly frustrated.

I'm looking forward to reading the next installments of this series. I will be reading them in publication order, and the next books are prequels to this one, so this would be a unique case where the story and the world would develop as we move further back in time. I'm giving this a 3.75;  it is a nice book when it comes to the thematic explorations and the atmosphere, but not so interesting when it comes to the plot itself. However, it was an intellectually satisfying read.


"A long leash is still a leash."