I’m sure this could have been done, since the rest of the story was such a high level (I think), so describing the abuse and murder scenes explicitly seems unecessary.

If the author was less talented, it might be the best they could do…..

A couple of points, however, by way of curiosity: first, you mention that Shakespeare is a great writer because he can present extremes of human behavior while showing how any person might take the same course, and I quite agree. I also quite agree that this story falls far short of the bard’s standard – and I think I would be safe in assuming that the author would admit that his sights were nowhere near that high. But is it so implausible to believe that the main character’s actions in the beginning aren’t justified – within the realm of his own scarred psyche? Can you honestly say you wouldn’t react the same way should such a thing happen to you? I know I can’t.

Motivation and justification aside, the way in which it was communicated by the author is obviously the more controversial point – and I do like Tim White’s point regarding the flashback seeming like it was inserted posthumously to add motivation for the murder. The timing of and the transition into that part of the story could have been implemented better. I will happily concede that the author probably didn’t have to go as far as he did with the descriptions, but I’ve already described why I found even this level of graphic description acceptable within the context of the larger story.

Which brings me to my second point: You’ve mentioned several times that you do not think the plot and the writing justifies the violence, mentioning once that these scenes were there merely to cover over cracks in the writing. I’m curious as to what those cracks are. Why do you feel the prose falls short?

I liked the interplay between Geronimous’s fear of the aliens AND his fear of the Daius, but I felt like the imagery tried too hard.

And, as someone else mentioned, there have been too many of these violent-really-more-like-pseudopod type stories on here lately…

Are you saying you can find something psychologically or emotionally in common with Shakespear’s MacBeth – a murderer, assassin and betrayer? There was more blood and gore and downright gratuitous violence in a single Shakespearean tragedy than this story could dream of, but since it’s written in Elizabethan English we seem prone to excuse it. How about the main character in Poe’s Telltale Heart, or Cask of Amontillado?

Now don’t misunderstand: I am not comparing this story to the classics of literature – I’m merely pointing out that unsympathetic characters have been widely used plot devices and certainly do not make for two dimensional writing.

In contrast to most other works of this subject matter, it’s pretty horrific, but that’s the point. Grunewald wanted viewers to feel uncomfortable, to know what kind of suffering was involved, because it increases the magnitude of Christ’s sacrifice.

Great, you say. Thanks for the art history lesson. What does this have to do with the main character being a murderer who exacts revenge on his previous molester (outside of the fact that the man used to be a priest)?

Easy. The author wants you to feel sick. He wants to put you outside of your comfort zone right from the start. After all, how else are you going to identify with a main character who was put permanently outside of his? The graphic description of the beheading does that (to a degree), but it also does more. It puts human physiology irrevocably, indellibly and gruesomely in the front of your mind for the remainder of the story. Think about it: everything in the main character’s past is portrayed as disgusting, visceral, uncomfortably warm and sickeningly sticky. It’s nasty.

It’s also the mechanic by which he is contrasted to the golem – a being of logic, wires and microcircuits, and it’s the antithesis to his transformation at the end of the story to something even more sterile and alien – an insect. His humanity falls away from him in wet, soil-stained chunks of flesh, and what remains can be seen by the reader as being preferable, even desireable after everything that has gone on before.

Going far beyond the obvious ploy of making the reader not feel quite so bad for him having to die in the end, it gives the reader pause for reflection well after the last word of the story: will his past affect this reborn species view of humanity? Is this the beginning of a future intergalactic enmity?

I’m usually vehemently against excessive gore and sex in stories, as it usually serves no purpose aside from cheap titillation. In this case, however, I make an exception. It was not only necessary to the story’s end, but the story was actually better for it. Even if it wasn’t pretty.

And the phrase ‘zipped minds’ amused me.

I disagree with Josh in the nature of the hive minded insects on Earth and find the mystery and intrigue in some of the paradoxes the Csorian node introduces, namely: Which came first, the node or the insect?

(apart from the ‘dream sequence’ as I didn’t see why it was in the story and it was probably unecessary)

But mostly, amazing. A near perfect 10

I liked this story. Yes, the rape scene bordered on the gratuitous, but ultimately it served the characterization, and the story wouldn’t have worked if he was a nice guy.

Actually, the only part that I didn’t really like was the idea that Earth’s insects turn out to be intelligent in some sort of collective way. That was hard to swallow – which I guess it was meant to be – but it also sort of telegraphed where the story was going. If we hadn’t been knocked over he head with the idea of hive intelligence, the emerging hive intelligence of the Csorian node would’ve been far more mysterious and intriguing.

I have to say this story made no sense to me whatever. I felt as if I’d just blundered into the middle of a movie where the characters’ histories, motivations, and reasons for being were established long before the story even began, let alone where I happened upon them, and I had no way of deducing them from context. The violence and buggery and expanded consciousness and whatnot just seemed to muddy the waters further for me.

I dunno about you guys, but as for me, an sf story can have all the mind-bending technologies, ideas, and special effects imaginable, but if it doesn’t have characters that I can in some way relate to or sympathize with,that make all the other stuff comprehensible and approachable, I just don’t care.

This story opens with one character beheading another in a particularly gruesome and graphic way, and, at least at first, I don’t know why. And the guy doing the beheading is (relatively speaking) the good guy! After that, everything else is a turn off.

Oh, and did I mention I didn’t like it much?