Milton Saperstein once said that `there is nobody as enslaved as the fanatic, the person in whom one impulse, one value, has assumed ascendancy over all'. This description fits the community of Waknuk to a tee. The Chrysalids, set in post-apocalyptic Labrador, is a book that point directly at the shortcomings of the main character's society (and indirectly at ours). The people of Waknuk believe that any person who does not fit `God's Image' perfectly can not be human, and are children of the devil. This fanatic view causes unnecessary fear. It is a common thread running through all the characters, from the fear the Waknuk people have of having mutant children which will forcibly be taken from them, and of the Fringe people and their raids, to the fear David et al constantly experience as the try to hide their secret from everyone.

There really is no...