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Darwin's Children

A Novel

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About this listen

 Greg Bear’s Nebula Award–winning novel, Darwin’s Radio, painted a chilling portrait of humankind on the threshold of a radical leap in evolution. Now Bear continues his provocative tale of the human race confronted by an uncertain future, where “survival of the fittest” takes on astonishing and controversial new dimensions.

Eleven years have passed since SHEVA, an ancient retrovirus, was discovered in human DNA—a retrovirus that caused mutations in the human genome and heralded the arrival of a new wave of genetically enhanced humans. Now these changed children have reached adolescence . . . and face a world that is outraged about their very existence. For these special youths, possessed of remarkable, advanced traits that mark a major turning point in human development, are also ticking time bombs harboring hosts of viruses that could exterminate the “old” human race.

Fear and hatred of the virus children have made them a persecuted underclass, quarantined by the government in special “schools,” targeted by federally sanctioned bounty hunters, and demonized by hysterical segments of the population. But pockets of resistance have sprung up among those opposed to treating the children like dangerous diseases—and who fear the worst if the government’s draconian measures are carried to their extreme.

Scientists Kaye Lang and Mitch Rafelson are part of this small but determined minority. Once at the forefront of the discovery and study of the SHEVA outbreak, they now live as virtual exiles in the Virginia suburbs with their daughter, Stella—a bright, inquisitive virus child who is quickly maturing, straining to break free of the protective world her parents have built around her, and eager to seek out others of her kind.

But for all their precautions, Kaye, Mitch, and Stella have not slipped below the government’s radar. The agencies fanatically devoted to segregating and controlling the new-breed children monitor their every move—watching and waiting for the opportunity to strike the next blow in their escalating war to preserve “humankind” at any cost.© 2003 Greg Bear; (P)2003 Books on Tape, Inc. Adventure Fantasy Genre Fiction Hard Science Fiction Medical Science Fiction Thriller & Suspense
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Extremely well written and well narrated - a tale set in a slightly different reality, where a retrovirus has resulted in the birth of SHEVA children.The Government steps in and the children are segregated and removed from the general population.
I found myself driving the long way home all the time (I put my audible downloads onto CDs for car journeys) so that I could carry on listening to this fascinating book. After I finished it I went out to buy the first book - Darwin's Radio - so I could continue the experience.
My recommendation? Choose this download. It has been one of my favourite audible titles.

Excellent and engrossing

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