| Author: | Harry Harrison |
| Copyright: | 1984 |
| Date Reviewed: | 12/25/86 |
| Rating: | 9.0 |
Synopsis: In this alternate history novel, the meteor that killed the dinosaurs never hits the Earth. Their descendants thrived and grew to become intelligent beings. Meanwhi1e, humans also reached self awareness. This book is the struggle between these two species.
The hunters of Amahast's sammad are hunting in the south. With them is Amahast's son Kerrick. Kerrick is only nine years old but he hopes to become a mighty hunter like his father. They are searching for food for the sammad but instead they find murgu. The Tanu hate the murgu and kill all that they find.
Vainte is a member of the proud Yilane race - what the Tanu call murgu. She travels to the new city called Alpeasak aboard a uruketo to take command of the new city. All of the people of Inegban* must travel to Alpeasak before the home city dies from the coming ice age. The new city is being badly mismanaged by the current eistaa and Vainte is come to relieve her. Traveling with Vainte is a member of her efenburu named Enge. Enge is a Daughter of Life, although most of the Yilane call them the Daughters of Death because they refuse to die when expelled from their city. The Daughters of Life hold a high reverence for all life and seek peace. Vainte meets Vanalpe who builds the city and discovers the vicious attack perpetrated on the males and guards on the birthing beach. She sends Stallan the hunter to seek out those who killed the males.
Vainte and Stallan find Amahast's sammad and kill the whole tribe except for Kerrick and Ysel who are taken prisoner. Enge is given the task of communicating with the ustuzou. Ysel the girl responds stupidly but Kerrick holds his tongue. Malas<, the eistaa of Inegban* comes to Alpeasak to see what progress Vainte is making. She is pleased at the work being done but leaves Alpeasak to spy for her. This angers Vainte and in rage she kills the stupid Ysel. As she turns to kill Kerrick, he pleads for his life in Yilane, showing that he is intelligent and has learned the language.
Herilak's sister was wife to Amahast. He vows revenge when he comes upon the bones of his brother-in-law's sammad. He comes back with his own sammad party and kills a Yilane survey team. As he is about to retreat, he sees the face of young Kerrick who tried to escape but is now caught in a vegetarian trap. The Yilane are well adept at the science of gene manipulation. After the escape attempt, Vainte learns that the ustuzou have the capability of lying. This is something no Yilane can do because her every body movement would contradict her spoken words. Vainte uses this capability to kill Alpeasak.
Kerrick lives among the Yilane for many years and eventually all but forgets his origins. Though he is leashed to a big dumb fargi named Inlenu*, he has free access over most of Alpeasak. He is seen often in the presence of the eistaa, which gives him a status above most of the inhabitants of Alpeasak. When he is 15 years old, Vainte takes him on a journey to Inegban*. The Yilane return to Gendasi with a plan to kill all the ustuzou. They take Kerrick along so that he may talk to prisoners and find the locations of other tribes. On the first expedition, Kerrick becomes very ill. On the second, he is forced to talk to Herilak who has been captured. Almost all the members of Herilak's sammad are now dead. Herilak recognizes Kerrick by the skymetal knife hanging from his neck and succeeds in bringing a flood of old memories back to Kerrick. In his anger, he kills many fargi. Herilak and Kerrick flee the Yilane camp dragging Inlenu* with them but Ortnar, a member of Herilak's sammad, kills Inlenu* in revenge for what was done to the sammad he belonged to.
Herilak, Kerrick and Ortnar meet up with another sammad and convince them to send an armed party south to ambush the murgu. They are successful an afterwards decide to bring the entire two sammads south for the winter, where there will be good hunting.
Alpeasak prospers and it is decided that all of Inegban* should come to it. Alpeasak now becomes the home city. When Malas< comes to take the thrown, Vainte is no longer hateful of her. After recovering from the near fatal wound, inflicted on her by Kerrick, her whole aim is to kill all the ustuzou, especially Kerrick. Stallan shares her wish. The Yilane have bred a creature with a large eye capable of taking pictures. Attached to a great bird, it flies all over Gendasi to seek out Kerrick and his sammad. An attack is launched but this time, instead of coming up by way of sea, as they usually do (and lost badly the last time), the Yilane army comes north by way of land. Tanu scouts see the approaching army just in time to get the sammad to retreat and find a place to defend. They fight, fall back and fight again many times. Many fargi are killed but eventually the sammad reach the White Mountains where the cold blooded murgu can not go.
The sammad now sets out to the west to find a place where they can hunt and be free of the Yilane. When they can't go west anymore because of the desert and the way north is closed because of dark skinned Tanu who fight for their land, Kerrick's sammad again travel south. Soon they find a new kind of Tanu who call themselves the Sasku. The Sasku are also dark skinned, like those in the north, but they welcome Kerrick's sammad because of their trained mastodons. The Sasku worship the mastodons. Unlike the Tanu Herilak and Kerrick know, these Tanu don't move with the seasons to find better hunting. They have found ways of making food grow from the Earth and keeping animals in captivity so they never grow hungry, even in winter. With their help, the sammad survives the winter, even though the hunting is poor in these parts. Kerrick and his wife Armun decided to live with the Sasku and learn their ways. Kerrick is very happy here and no longer feels the need to kill murgu. Soon his son will be born.
The child is born on the same day as a mastodon calf and the Sasku see this as a good sign. The sammad must move but before they can make plans to cross the desert, the murgu come again. The sammad and the Sasku join forces. Because their city is so defendable and because they can raid the murgu as they sleep, the Tanu are easily victorious. Now Kerrick must make a difficult decision. Though he wishes to live in peace, he knows this can not be done while the murgu live on this continent. They w111 never tire of killing Tanu. He must take the battle to their own city.
The sammad head north and east back to the shore to draw the murgu out. Then they split with the women going north to safety and the small Tanu army going south to Alpeasak. The Yilane are much more scientifically advanced than the Tanu but they don't know about fire. The Tanu get as close as they can to the Alpeasak city walls and then destroy the whole city with fire. Almost all of the Yilane are killed in the fire. Stallan escapes but is killed while she fights Kerrick. Vainte and Enge also escape back to Entoban* and Kerrick warns them never to return.
Review: At 508 pages "West of Eden" is a long novel but a very good one because it was able to keep my attention fixed for all that time. I found it difficult to put down even after five hours of continuous reading. I read most of it in one day, which is quite a feat for this size book. The back cover compares this work to "Dune" and indeed it is an epic, if not quite as complex as the other. The author introduces two races, gives both of them a language and a culture and then sets the plot in motion. Even though the author is fair to give us a real view of the reptilian Yilane, their strengths and frailties, I found myself rooting for their destruction. Or perhaps it is because of this detailed description. If they had just been evil I would not have cared so much - it would have been inevitable. A book really succeeds if it can make me wonder at my own emotions. "West of Eden" is reminiscent of "Lucifer's Hammer" by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle. In both books there is a lot of warfare and bloodshed but this one succeeds even more than the other because the adversaries are more three dimensional.
The novel failed a few times when it repeated situations too many times. In three separate incidents the Daughters of Death were sacrificed because their deaths would be a small loss to the community. Although I enjoyed reading about the advanced genetic science of the Yilane, I believe the author went a little too far. I might believe the uruketo boats but not the sanduu microscope or the high flying camera. This seemed a little too borrowed from our own technology. I think the story would have been even better if the Yilane had less to work with and more evenly matched with the Tanu.
"West of Eden" ended with a couple of Yilane survivors escaping to Entoban*. This sets the stage for a sequel which I look forward to reading. I just hope it is more than a "Revenge of the Empire" type near obliteration novel.