childhood's end by Arthur C clarke..

wow what a story!

Really built up the suspsense about the looks of the aliens and then.. :D wow!! hahaha!! Loved it! that really scared me .. sort of anti climax tho that they din have any ulterior motive and very really benovalent creatures...

but the story slightly scared me about spirituality.. he is making fun(?) or interpreting spirituality is such a way as to run creepies down my spine....

being one with god and all that... is it like this..? wow...being one with all - losing individuality ? is it really good? really creepy.

The overlords - I donot feel sad for them.. its not bad thing that they cant achieve oneness with overmind.. they have their individuality.. its a good thing.? hmm should humans envy them or feel sad for them? ( atleast from what happened in the story - Lucky..?)

He predicted that social structure will change in 1953 with the advent of oral contraceptive and DNA testing... hmmm society doesnot change at the speed of science.. there is a lot more lag. I understand.. even I wud think like arthur but...society din change all that much yet- did it? its been like 40 years now?? but he was dead on that there will be DNA testing in 50 years! :)

His prediction about entertainment have surely come true - "they watch 3-4 hours of entertainment per day and there is so much entertainment available that one would spend a life time if one wanted to watch everything that is available." :-)

He was wrong about cold war not ending :) din see India and China coming up so strong ...

He predicted end of racism and inter race marriages- which is kinda coming true..

I love how he came up with such different stories for the same theme - aliens.

Rama 1,2,3 is a different kinda alien different story, the 2001 space odyssey aliens are again different and this is something else...:)

It is properly tempered - the society in 2001 series has changed a lot because human race went out into space.. the society is slightly different from now in childhoods end because human race never left earth...I like Arthur Clarke.