Week 12

Blood child (in addition to week 12)

1. What is your reaction to the text you just read?

My reaction to the text was slight confusion and questions. Did the boy just have sex with the creature? Does this society not have problems with issues like pedophilia?  If the humans are called Terrans and found the aliens they must have left earth and found the aliens’ home. Did they travel to another planet via intergalactic or interstellar travel? How far in the future is this taking place? How are they communicating? They must be speaking the same language, so one must have taught the other. How were they able to avoid war when humans first came in contact with the aliens? Why can’t the aliens birth their own kind?

2. What connections did you make with the story that you read? Discuss the elements of the work with which you were able to connect,

What I did have an understanding of that I found interesting was the reversal of gender roles. The male were expected to host the aliens and give birth so that female humans can give birth to their own kind. What stood out to me was the uncertainty and fear the boy had about being a host. Maybe it was his young age, but since I never had to worry about things like that, reading about it from a boy’s perspective was really eye opening since women in our reality have to deal with this question and worry. The story also touched on the topic of gun control. Humans weren’t allowed to have guns for the sake of the humans hosting aliens. Despite the gun ban, the main character’s family had a rifle, meaning its safe to assume many other families in the story would have to as well secretly.

3. What changes would you make to adapt this story into another medium? What medium would you use? What changes would you make?

If I were to adapt this into a movie, I would add a small introduction to premise of the story so the audience isn’t just dropped off in the middle of it with no clue going on. I do however enjoy the aspect of finding out more about the premise as you read into the story, so my introduction would just be a small montage/flashback that doesn’t reveal too much. I would also probably change the age of the boy to someone older since the vast majority of the public wouldn’t be so comfortable with the idea of pedophilia let alone the idea of an interspecies sexual relationship with aliens forcing children to host their creatures.