Summary and Reviews of The Mother Code by Carole Stivers

The Mother Code by Carole Stivers

The Mother Code

by Carole Stivers
  • BookBrowse Review:
  • Critics' Consensus (4):
  • First Published:
  • Aug 25, 2020, 352 pages
  • Paperback:
  • Aug 2021, 352 pages
  • Rate this book

About This Book

Book Summary

What it means to be human-–and a mother-–is put to the test in Carole Stivers' debut novel set in a world that is more chilling and precarious than ever.

It's 2049, and the survival of the human race is at risk. Earth's inhabitants must turn to their last resort: a plan to place genetically engineered children inside the cocoons of large-scale robots—to be incubated, birthed, and raised by machines. But there is yet one hope of preserving the human order—an intelligence programmed into these machines that renders each unique in its own right—the Mother Code.



Kai is born in America's desert southwest, his only companion his robot Mother, Rho-Z. Equipped with the knowledge and motivations of a human mother, Rho-Z raises Kai and teaches him how to survive. But as children like Kai come of age, their Mothers transform too—in ways that were never predicted. When government survivors decide that the Mothers must be destroyed, Kai must make a choice. Will he break the bond he shares with Rho-Z? Or will he fight to save the only parent he has ever known?
 
In a future that could be our own, The Mother Code explores what truly makes us human—and the tenuous nature of the boundaries between us and the machines we create.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Reviews

BookBrowse Review

BookBrowse

Stivers' novel is not merely a book-length thought experiment about the consequences of a scenario like the one she envisions. It also carries immense and poignant resonance about the vitality and fragility of human lives and relationships and the complexity of human emotional needs, offering heartbreaking scenes of both optimism and grief. Despite its apocalyptic premise, The Mother Code is, at its heart, a surprisingly hopeful novel, one that offers a particularly generous depiction of scientists using their skills and training to address a future that they know they will never see...continued

Full Review Members Only (857 words)

(Reviewed by Norah Piehl).

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Beyond the Book



Archaebacteria

Yellowstone's Morning Glory Spring with yellow color from archaebacteriaCarole Stivers' novel The Mother Code imagines the rapid spread of a deadly genetically engineered disease called IC-NAN. The widespread proliferation of the disease is due in large part to its receptive archaebacteria, which serve as both host and incubator for the IC-NAN's DNA; as one character puts it, "these archaebacteria are capable of taking in the [nonlethal] linear form, making more copies of it, and manufacturing more [deadly] spherical NANs from that DNA." But what are archaebacteria?

Archaebacteria — or, as they are more properly called, archaea, are microbes that are similar to bacteria in size and simplicity but actually work quite differently on a molecular level. Scientists now believe that archaea form a third, ...

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Read-Alikes

Read-Alikes Full readalike results are for members only

If you liked The Mother Code, try these:

  • Big Time jacket

    Big Time

    by Ben H. Winters

    Published 2024

    About this book

    More by this author

    In this "wild and wonderful" (Lou Berney) corporate espionage thriller that takes the adage "time is money" and makes it frighteningly so, an everywoman FDA employee stumbles upon a dark, clandestine conspiracy to harvest and sell people's time.

  • Blind Spots jacket

    Blind Spots

    by Thomas Mullen

    Published 2024

    About this book

    More by this author

    A riveting crime novel with a speculative edge about the ways our perceptions of reality can be manipulated.

We have 7 read-alikes for The Mother Code, but non-members are limited to two results. To see the complete list of this book's read-alikes, you need to be a member.
Search read-alikes
How we choose read-alikes
Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

BookBrowse Book Club

  • Book Jacket
    The Cover Girl
    by Amy Rossi
    Find them early enough, and they will always be her girls.

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket

    The Magician of Tiger Castle
    by Louis Sachar

    The author of Holes returns with a magical adult debut about forbidden love and a kingdom on the brink of collapse.

  • Book Jacket

    Too Old for This
    by Samantha Downing

    A retired killer's secret is at risk when a visitor arrives—her only option? Another murder.

  • Book Jacket

    This Here Is Love
    by Princess Joy L. Perry

    Three people—two enslaved, one indentured—struggle to overcome the limits and labels of their painful shared pasts.

  • Book Jacket

    A Club of One's Own
    by BookBrowse

    Dreaming of starting or reviving a book club? A Club of One’s Own is the essential guide to doing it right.

Win This Book
Win All the Men I've Loved Again

All the Men I've Loved Again by Christine Pride

Christine Pride's solo debut explores a woman's love triangle in her 20s that unexpectedly resurfaces in her 40s.

Enter

Book
Trivia

  • Book Trivia

    Can you name the title?

    Test your book knowledge with our daily trivia challenge!

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

I N R S

and be entered to win..