Shori Matthews Rocks!

I must say that of the books we are reading for class, Fledgling by Octavia Butler is probably the most original and creative. Not only does Butler create a truly unique set of rules and sociological situations compared to the norm, but also pushes the boundaries of ethical situations, at first making the reader rather uncomfortable while keeping them engaged.
I feel that the world of Fledgling is very unique because Octavia Butler does not conform to the regular "rules" of being a vampire. First, vampires are not made by affecting humans, they are their own species, called the Ina. The only restraints of typical vampire life are that they are still vulnerable to sunlight, and grow very tired, and sometimes cannot stay awake during daylight hours, and they drink blood as sustenance. As far as sunlight is concerned in the case of Shori Matthews, the main character, she has been genetically engineered using the DNA of African-American humans to increase the melanin content of her skin as well as her ability to stay awake during daylight hours.
The Ina society is truly unique owing to several factors. First is the need for Ina to live with their symbionts, the humans from whom they feed. In many cases of vampire lore, the human is merely a victim that is frightened during the feeding, often in pain, and is simply discarded after the feeding. The Ina live with, bond and have loving relationships with their human symbionts, thanks to their potent venemous saliva. Once bitten a few times, the human symbiont becomes physically addicted to their particular vampire. When bitten, the symbiont experiences extreme pleasure, and the venom also increases a human's longevity up to 200 years. The physical bond between an Ina and their "sym" is so strong that in many cases, the human will die if their Ina does. They explain in Fledgling that the makeup of each Ina's venom is unique, and the humans become addicted to that unique compound. Another Ina may take over the use of a symbiont, but the symbiont and new Ina do not experience pleasure for quite a few feedings before they can be taken over. It is often frightening for the sym, and the Ina can smell the other previous Ina in the human for quite a while, which in itself is meant to repel others.
The Ina also have a unique set of circumstances for dealing with each other. Male and female Ina do not live together, but with groups of their same-sex siblings and all their symbionts, visiting each other's households for the purpose of mating. A group of brothers is usually mated with a group of sisters, and they all mate in groups. They do not live together due to the strong pheromones emitted by female Ina, which increases aggression physically and sexually. Although vampires are not capable of reproducing until around the age of 70, Shori, at only 53 is already irritating the male Ina around her.
The thing mentioned most in class about this book was the fact that although she is 53 years old, and mature enough to be sexually active, she appears as a human to only be 8-10 years of age. This goes against anything normal in our society today and many people have a lot of difficulty as Shori embarks on a sexual relationship with a 22 year old man in the beginning of the book, as well as with several female symbionts she acquires later on in the story. By the end of the book, I personally had stopped giving the sex scenes a second thought, because I understood that her actual age was much more important than her appearance.
I thought the race angle was very interesting as it was seen from more than two sides. The book begins with Shori waking up, having no memory of her first 53 years after having been attacked, along with all of her female family members. By the end of the book, you discover that she and her family were attacked by another clan of Ina, primarily because of her race. Now, you must think about what this means. Shori is mostly Ina, but has been genetically altered with human DNA so that she appears to be black. Therefore, is she hated for being human, or for being black? Or is it because she was genetically altered, period?
There are many, many factors that go into making this a unique vampire story, and I love the originality of the book.