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The Sparrow: A Novel [Paperback]

Mary Doria Russell (Author)
3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (360 customer reviews)
List Price: CDN$ 18.95
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Book Description

Release Date: Sep 8 1997 | Series: Ballantine Reader's Circle
"A NOTABLE ACHIEVEMENT . . . Russell shows herself to be a skillful storyteller who subtly and expertly builds suspense."
--USA Today

"AN EXPERIENCE NOT TO BE MISSED . . . If you have to send a group of people to a newly discovered planet to contact a totally unknown species, whom would you choose? How about four Jesuit priests, a young astronomer, a physician, her engineer husband, and a child prostitute-turned-computer-expert? That's who Mary Doria Russell sends in her new novel, The Sparrow. This motley combination of agnostics, true believers, and misfits becomes the first to explore the Alpha Centuri world of Rakhat with both enlightening and disastrous results. . . . Vivid and engaging . . . An incredible novel."
--Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

"POWERFUL . . . Father Emilio Sandoz [is] the only survivor of a Jesuit mission to the planet Rakhat, 'a soul . . . looking for God.' We first meet him in Italy . . . sullen and bitter. . . . But he was not always this way, as we learn through flashbacks that tell the story of the ill-fated trip. . . . The Sparrow tackles a difficult subject with grace and intelligence."
--San Francisco Chronicle

"SMOOTH STORYTELLING AND GORGEOUS CHARACTERIZATION . . . Important novels leave deep cracks in our beliefs, our prejudices, and our blinders. The Sparrow is one of them."
--Entertainment Weekly

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From Amazon

In 2019, humanity finally finds proof of extraterrestrial life when a listening post in Puerto Rico picks up exquisite singing from a planet which will come to be known as Rakhat. While United Nations diplomats endlessly debate a possible first contact mission, the Society of Jesus quietly organizes an eight-person scientific expedition of its own. What the Jesuits find is a world so beyond comprehension that it will lead them to question the meaning of being "human." When the lone survivor of the expedition, Emilio Sandoz, returns to Earth in 2059, he will try to explain what went wrong... Words like "provocative" and "compelling" will come to mind as you read this shocking novel about first contact with a race that creates music akin to both poetry and prayer. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

An enigma wrapped inside a mystery sets up expectations that prove difficult to fulfill in Russell's first novel, which is about first contact with an extraterrestrial civilization. The enigma is Father Emilio Sandoz, a Jesuit linguist whose messianic virtues hide his occasional doubt about his calling. The mystery is the climactic turn of events that has left him the sole survivor of a secret Jesuit expedition to the planet Rakhat and, upon his return, made him a disgrace to his faith. Suspense escalates as the narrative ping-pongs between the years 2016, when Sandoz begins assembling the team that first detects signs of intelligent extraterrestrial life, and 2060, when a Vatican inquest is convened to coax an explanation from the physically mutilated and emotionally devastated priest. A vibrant cast of characters who come to life through their intense scientific and philosophical debates help distract attention from the space-opera elements necessary to get them off the Earth. Russell brings her training as a paleoanthropologist to bear on descriptions of the Runa and Jana'ata, the two races on Rakhat whose differences are misunderstood by the Earthlings, but the aliens never come across as more than variations of primitive earthly cultures. The final revelation of the tragic human mistake that ends in Sandoz's degradation isn't the event for which readers have been set up. Much like the worlds it juxtaposes, this novel seems composed of two stories that fail to come together. BOMC, QPB and One Spirit Book Club selections.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Customer Reviews

Most helpful customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars What an amazing book! July 9 2012
By Love Reading
Format:Paperback
What an absolutely amazing book! I was afraid to read this book for a LONG time. It came highly recommneded by a friend...twice he went into it, explaining how interesting it was. I borrowed, but was hesitant to read, knowing some of the content was intense and painful.

But I finally read it, and am so glad I did. Maybe this was the time for me to read it--the story was great, but for me it also allowed me to find words and emotion, to cry out some of the intense pain I had been feeling--the disillusionment with life and faith, the things we don't understand when God could have prevented...oh and I loved the Father General, how he reached out and cared--Canotti (sp?) of course too.
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5.0 out of 5 stars A HIGHLY INTELLIGENT TREATISE ON PERSONAL THEOLOGY - A TRUE CLASSIC May 1 2008
By NeuroSplicer HALL OF FAME TOP 50 REVIEWER
Format:Paperback
Theology can become a distant logical exercise of dry doctrine and easy theoretical conclusions. When it comes down to the wet choices of real life most such theoretical Theology is found wanting as it can offer only limited answers. This is Theology of the other kind, the real one.

Mary Doria Russell has created a highly intelligent story: what would the story of a future saint be? Say, a Jesuit spearheading an exploratory mission to an alien civilization as a linguist of unique abilities; a former outcast that found his true calling as a man of the Cloth and God's face in all the hungry he fed and all the orphans he sheltered and all the lost he bough back from desperation. And then God asked for more. Much more. Is God real or a mere human construct? Can Faith survive anything?

This is one of those books that stays with you for ever. Read THE SPARROW first, CHILDREN OF THE GOD later in order to enjoy them both more.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!
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5.0 out of 5 stars The story is strong - it inspired a musical journey Sep 11 2007
By Malcolm C. Smith
Format:Paperback
I found the book to be very strong, in fact all of the members of our band Metaphor read it and decided to write and record a concept CD or rock opera, based on the book! We got the author's permission, and voila, it's The Sparrow by Metaphor. A great complement to the book, you can hear samples at metaphor.org

So, it's an absolutely inspiring, disturbing, and thought provoking book.
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Most recent customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars The BEST intellectual sci-fi book in existence
I have been reading "legitimate" Sci-Fi (not fantasy) for over 40 years and this book (with its sequel "Children of God") is undoubtedly the BEST, most awe-inspiring, enrapturing... Read more
Published on May 2 2011 by M. Miller
5.0 out of 5 stars One of my Favorites
The Sparrow is a book about the existence of an alien race on another planet, and the expedition of a space crew to explore and learn from this newly discovered race. Read more
Published on Mar 1 2010 by Sleuth Review
4.0 out of 5 stars Great characters, good plot, so-so ending
This is something of a rarity among all the science fiction titles published every year: it's a highly intelligent work of literature. Read more
Published on Feb 13 2006 by Bob Alexander
5.0 out of 5 stars Couldn't put it down.
This book grabs you and throws you into the world of M.D.R's imagination. My wife read it after I was done with it and had to put it down because she became so attached to the... Read more
Published on Dec 3 2004 by Paul J. Redmond
5.0 out of 5 stars Amazing
What a truly amazing book! I think it must be close to the best book I've ever read. Although it's classed as science fiction, it's better described as a book that examines the... Read more
Published on Jun 17 2004 by Soleil Sydney
3.0 out of 5 stars I couldn't finish it
I tried to read this book a few years ago, and I struggled just to get a quarter of the way through... Then I just put it down. Which is something I rarely ever do. Read more
Published on Jun 15 2004 by K. L. Obrien
5.0 out of 5 stars Loved it!
A friend of mine who reads a ton recommended this book, and although I am not generally a fan of this type of book, I thought I would give it a try. I LOVED IT! Read more
Published on Jun 14 2004
5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best books I've ever read
What an amazing book! Though superficially it could be classified as science fiction, this book defies genre. Read more
Published on May 24 2004 by M. Fairchild
4.0 out of 5 stars Entertaining reading
Not exactly sci-fi. Certainly not theology. A study of ethics and lessons of history? A little bit of all of these. Read more
Published on April 22 2004 by C. Myers
2.0 out of 5 stars But the characters are all so stupid
In years gone by the Jesuits travelled far and wide trying to convert civilisations to Christianity. Read more
Published on April 8 2004 by Tom Munro
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