The Second Coming of Charles Darwin
Manufacturer: Amazon.com
Average Rating: 5.0
List Price: $0.49
Offer Price: $0.49
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Product Description
Product Description
I wrote this satiric fable in hopes of adding a new and phantasmagorical wrinkle to the Darwin Wars, the ongoing conflict between religious conservatives and evolutionary thinkers over the source of our planet's biological diversity. The plot turns on Omar, a cyborg tortoise dispatched via time machine from a high-tech future to the Galápagos Islands of September 10, 1835. His audacious mission: to alter the local fauna so radically that, when Charles Darwin arrives seven days hence, he will never become inspired to father the theory of natural selection.
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Customer Reviews
A work of distinction
Rating: 5 (2006-07-23)
Ah, heck. I just had to read this tale of a cyborg Galápagos; a programmed, impulsive yet morally compassed tortoise on an extinction mission. A lightly humorous and remarkably intellectual heavy weight, The Second Coming of Charles Darwin is both crisp and entertaining. James Morrow writes with almost cynic distinction to produce a satirical epiphany that may dictate a second reading in order to grasp it - unless examined lightly to match the fashion of its writing.
Eugen M. Bacon
Amazon Shorts Author, The Hybrid/ The Firemaker: A Hybrid Story
Unusual and Awesome
Rating: 5 (2006-05-02)
"The Second coming of Charles Darwin" tells the story of a cyborg tortoise and his companion, a religious zealot, on their quest to prevent the development of Darwin's theory of evolution. In other words, this story is a model of quirkiness and offbeat sensibilities. The main character, though a cyborg tortoise, has more personality and vibrancy than many a human protagonist and the history is well researched, though the futuristic technology is questionable at best. This is the story for you if you want something unusual. It would be perfect if it refrained from a rather drippy detour into moralizing against shortsightedness at the very end. This story is definitely worth reading.
MORROW HAS A STYLE OF HIS OWN! FASCINATING CONCEPT!
Rating: 5 (2006-04-10)
I could tell by the title this would be a satire, and what a satire it is! James Morrow at his best!
He must have written it with his tongue planted firmly between his teeth ... and I read it with a big grin on my face. He certainly knows how to turn a phrase and how to make his readers think.
However, I didn't have to think too hard because I'm grounded in the Bible, so I read this story for pure entertainment ... and that's what this talented author delivered.
Definitely not Fictionus Genericus
Rating: 5 (2005-10-21)
James Morrow is one of those authors that comes along only a couple of times in a lifetime who can leave you staring at the wall, lost in thought, but grinning because you can imagine the twinkle in his eyes as he turns each phrase. From the first of his works I read, "Towing Jehovah," to this last piece, I've been fascinated, captivated, and entertained. Here is your chance to learn great life secrets from a turtle, disocver that the most generic essence of man might be a giant egret - and learn that, evolution or not, it is indeed turtles ... all the way down.
Always the points counterpoint
Rating: 5 (2005-08-23)
Jim Morrow has returned after a few years without a book on the shelves to bring us his prose in short form; an area in which his ideas excel and don't feel rushed or squashed.
In "The Second Coming of Charles Darwin" we meet a automatonic galapogos tortoise who is sent back in time with a vengeant man wanting to right the moral wrings of the future by preventing what he feels is the root of all moral wrongs, the theory of evolution.
A fantastic short story sewn together with Jim's always welcome satire. He continually birngs his readers a great story, even if you agree with his pathos or not, Jim is one of the most underrated writers of our day.