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Concept
Oryx and Crake
Summary
Oryx and Crake is a 2003 novel by Canadian author Margaret Atwood. She has described the novel as speculative fiction and adventure romance, rather than pure science fiction, because it does not deal with things "we can't yet do or begin to do", yet goes beyond the amount of realism she associates with the novel form. It focuses on a lone character called Snowman, who finds himself in a bleak situation with only creatures called Crakers to keep him company. The reader learns of his past, as a boy called Jimmy, and of genetic experimentation and pharmaceutical engineering that occurred under the purview of Jimmy's peer, Glenn "Crake".
The book was first published by McClelland and Stewart. It was shortlisted for the 2003 Man Booker Prize for Fiction, as well as for the 2004 Orange Prize for Fiction. Oryx and Crake is the first of the MaddAddam trilogy, followed by The Year of the Flood (2009) and MaddAddam (2013).
The novel focuses on a character called "Snowman", living in a post-apocalyptic world near a small group of primitive and innocent human-like creatures whom he calls Crakers. Flashbacks reveal that Snowman was once a boy named Jimmy who grew up in a world dominated by multinational corporations that built privileged walled compounds to isolate and protect their employees and the employees' families from a degenerating outside society. The companies had operated by developing and marketing advanced technology products such as medical treatments and genetically engineered hybrid animals, but now no other humans are evident, and the compounds have become decaying ruins.
Near starvation, Snowman decides to return to the ruins of a compound named RejoovenEsense to search for supplies, even though his excursion risks encountering dangers including feral populations of the hybridized animals. He concocts an explanation for the Crakers, who regard him as a teacher, and begins his foraging expedition.
In Snowman's recollection of past events, Jimmy's family moves to the HelthWyzer compound, where his father works as a genetic engineer.
Official source
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