Emergence (Palmer novel): Difference between revisions
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Candy's journal is recorded in [[Pitman shorthand]], in what used to be referred to as "telegraphic style," which is based on the means employed by those sending [[telegram]]s via Western Union late in the |
Candy's journal is recorded in [[Pitman shorthand]], in what used to be referred to as "telegraphic style," which is based on the means employed by those sending [[telegram]]s via Western Union late in the 19th and first half of the 20th centuries to save money. At that time telegrams were the quickest way to transmit hardcopy messages over significant distances. They were expensive; Western Union charged by the word. Hence unnecessary words were omitted; pronouns, conjunctions, most adjectives and/or adverbs. |
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The primary narrator's voice in ''Emergence'' is thus a sort of "''verbal'' shorthand". |
The primary narrator's voice in ''Emergence'' is thus a sort of "''verbal'' shorthand". |
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Revision as of 05:07, 23 January 2011
 First Edition cover of Emergence | |
| Author | David R. Palmer |
|---|---|
| Cover artist | Jim Burns |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Science fiction novel |
| Publisher | Bantam Spectra |
Publication date | November 1984 |
| Publication place | United States |
| Media type | Print (Paperback) |
| ISBN | ISBN 0-553-25519-3 (first edition, paperback) Parameter error in {{ISBNT}}: invalid character |
| OCLC | 12968116 |
Emergence is a science fiction book written by David R. Palmer and first published by Bantam Spectra in November 1984. It had three printings through July 1985, and was republished in 1990 as a "Signature Special Edition" with a few minor edits and a new afterword by the author.
Emergence was Palmer's first published novel. It was developed from a pair of Hugo[1] and Nebula award nominated novellas originally published in somewhat different form in Analog magazine. The novel itself was nominated for a Hugo Award, a pair of Locus awards (for first novel and science fiction novel), was a finalist for a Philip K. Dick Award, and won the Compton Crook Award.[1]
Wormhole Press was short-listed to release Tracking and re-release Emergence as both paperbacks and in hardcover, but as of October 2010 they appear to be out-of-business.
Plot
Candidia Maria Smith-Foster, an eleven-year-old girl, is unaware that she's a Homo post hominem, mankind's next evolutionary step. Hominems have higher IQs, they're stronger, faster, more resistant to illness and trauma, and have quicker reflexes. Their eyesight, hearing, and sense of smell are superior as well.
By the time the narrative opens, Candy has learned karate, having achieved her Fifth Degree Black Belt, from her neighbor, 73-year-old Soo Kim McDivot, who she is led to believe is merely a retired schoolteacher. McDivot, whom she calls "Teacher", is actually the discoverer of the H. post hominem species, and has identified and continues to mentor and lead a group of them, the AAs. As part of her karate training, she has learned to release her hysterical strength, which permits brief bursts of nearly superhuman activity.
With international relations rapidly deteriorating, Candy's father, publicly a small-town pathologist but actually a closet 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 H. sapiens. With Terry, her lifelong "retarded, adopted twin brother," a Hyacinthine macaw, who tends to "parrot" Candy's words even before she speaks, she rides out 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.
First the hunt turns up "Adam," a cheeky, irrepressibly punning, multitalented 13-year-old boy, who immediately sets out to win Candy's heart; next, Rollo Jones, a middle-aged physician with a broad history of survival-in-the-wilds experience ranging from a stint in the Peace Corps to mountain climbing; and finally, Kim Mellon, an early-20s mom whose background is in computer engineering with Lisa, her six-year-old daughter. Rollo reveals himself as a sociopath, whom Candy is forced to kill defending Terry and herself. Adam, Kim, and Lisa join Candy's quest for the AA community. As part of the search, Adam reveals that he is an ultralight aircraft pilot. Later he teaches Candy to fly.
Thereafter, an ultralight engine failure separates Candy from the others. After getting it running again, she spots a contrail, which leads her to Vandenberg Space Shuttle Launch Complex, where Teacher and the AAs are laboring to preflight a shuttle, renamed the Nathan Hale. They've identified those who wiped out mankind, the Bratstvo, translated as the "Brotherhood," a cabal of H. sapiens, working from inside the Russian military to destroy all H. post hominems. As insurance, they've placed a doomsday device in geosynchronous orbit, a Strontium-90 bomb whose fallout will render Earth uninhabitable for 200 years.
At this point, however, the AAs' plans have come unstuck: They've modified the Hale to reach geosynch orbit, though it's a one-way, suicide voyage for the crew; but the miniature robot handler they've built to penetrate the bomb-carrying rocket and disarm the doomsday device isn't up to the task. Candy realizes, with her small size and hysterical strength training, she's the only one who can get inside the warhead chamber and disarm the bomb. Despite the fact that it's a suicide mission, she volunteers.
Meanwhile, as Adam, Kim, and Lisa search for Candy, Terry begins relaying her thoughts, though initially they don't realize that's what they're hearing.
Arriving in orbit, Kyril Svetlanov, thought to be a Bratstvo defector, kills Harris Gilbert, the mission commander. Kyril turns out to have been a double agent, whose job ultimately was to sabotage the mission, but he doesn't know about Candy's karate skills. She breaks his neck and assumes responsibility for completing the mission.
Navigating across to the bomb-carrying rocket in a spacesuit, she disables the warhead. Then she resets the navigational computer to land on the dry lake at Edwards Air Force Base and tries to secure herself against a bulkhead in preparation for the stresses of reentry.
As the missile begins to power-up for reentry, Adam finally realizes Terry is in fact relaying Candy's thoughts; that somehow she is in fact in space, about to attempt reentry in a non-human-rated vehicle, and that she'll soon be landing at Edwards. He, Kim, and Lisa arrive as the missile is touching down, just in time to extract her, resuscitate her, and treat her injuries.
The author has left a number of threads trailing at the conclusion, some of which are followed-up on 25 years later in a sequel Tracking, serialized in Analog Science and Fact magazine in the summer and fall of 2008.
Style
Candy's journal is recorded in Pitman shorthand, in what used to be referred to as "telegraphic style," which is based on the means employed by those sending telegrams via Western Union late in the 19th and first half of the 20th centuries to save money. At that time telegrams were the quickest way to transmit hardcopy messages over significant distances. They were expensive; Western Union charged by the word. Hence unnecessary words were omitted; pronouns, conjunctions, most adjectives and/or adverbs.
The primary narrator's voice in Emergence is thus a sort of "verbal shorthand".
Novellas
Emergence (ISBN 0-553-25519-3), won the Compton Crook Award in 1985. It arose from a novella by the same title featured in the January, 1981, issue of Analog. This was followed by the February, 1983, Analog publication of the Seeking novella, which ultimately became part two of the novel. Thereafter the Emergence novella appeared in an anthology called Children of the Future. Both novellas also won reader's choice awards from Analog. Both were nominated for the Hugo award for best novella in their respective years, and the novel for best novel in 1985.