Criticism > Contemporary Literary Criticism > Butler, Octavia - Orson Scott Card (review date January 1992)

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Orson Scott Card (review date January 1992)

SOURCE: A review of Mind of My Mind, Patternmaster, and Survivor, in Fantasy & Science Fiction, January, 1992, pp. 52-4.

[In the following review, Card praises Butler for her development of the "psi" theme in her Patternist novels.]

It's odd, I know, to review novels that are out of print or available only in British editions. But Octavia Butler is far too important a novelist—and these books are far too powerful—to be languishing out of print in the United States.

While it's true that her Xenogenesis books (Dawn, Adulthood Rites, Imago) are more satisfying as hard science fiction, and show how much power her storytelling has gained in the years of her career, the fact remains that these are wonderful, inventive novels that deserve to be read. They are even worth hunting down from mail-order and specialty stores until such time as a U.S. publisher gets on the...

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1. Introduction
2. Principal Works
3. Criticism
   1. Ruth Salvaggio (essay date Summer 1984)
   2. Octavia Butler with Frances M. Beal (interview date March/April 1986)
   3. Sandra Y. Govan (essay date Spring-Summer 1986)
   4. Adele S. Newson (review date Summer 1989)
   5. Frances Bonner (essay date Spring 1990)
   6. Hoda M. Zaki (essay date July 1990)
   7. Octavia Butler with Randall Kenan (interview date Spring 1991)
   8. Orson Scott Card (review date January 1992)
   9. Michelle Erica Green (essay date 1994)
   10. Rebecca O. Johnson (review date February 1994)
   11. Elyce Rae Helford (essay date Summer 1994)
   12. Hoda Zaki (review date July 1994)
   13. Cathy Peppers (essay date March 1995)
   14. Jim Miller (review date February/March 1996)
   15. Danille Taylor-Guthrie (review date 31 March 1996)
   16. Octavia Butler with Stephen W. Potts (interview date November 1996)
   17. Madelyn Jablon (essay date 1997)
4. Further Reading
5. Copyright

1. Octavia Butler