David's younger sister Petra demonstrates exceptionally strong telepathic talent when her horse is attacked by a wildcat-she calls to all the telepaths for help across the entire Waknuk area, and stuns those closest to her. He advises David on the wisdom of hiding his and the others' ability, and later kills the husband of one of the group's members who was planning to blackmail the telepaths. David's Uncle Axel, who learned about the group from talking to David about his telepathy when he was young, advises David and protects them from persecution. Later, Sophie's family attempts to escape from the reprisals (ceremonies in which blasphemies are sterilized) when her wet footprints are seen and reported by a local boy.ĭavid and other children in Waknuk hide their own form of mutation: telepathy. He makes friends with Sophie, a girl who secretly has six toes on one of her feet. David Strorm, the son of Waknuk's most religious man, Joseph Strorm, has dreams of large cities and "horseless carts", although he does not understand why he has these dreams or what they mean, and is cautious about mentioning it to his father, lest he raise suspicion that he's a mutant. The inland rural settlement of Waknuk is a frontier farming community, populated with hardy and pious individuals, and is where the story mainly takes place. The government's position is considered both cynical and heretical by many of the orthodox frontier community, and it is suggested that they support the usage of these animals for the sole purpose of their greater efficiency. These are deemed by the government to be legitimate breeds, either preexisting or achieved through conventional breeding. Arguments occur over the keeping of a tailless cat or the possession of over-sized horses. Humans with even minor mutations are considered blasphemies and either killed or sterilized and banished to the Fringes, a lawless and untamed area rife with animal and plant mutations, and suggested to be contaminated with radiation. The inhabitants practise a form of fundamentalist Christianity they believe that to follow God's word and prevent another Tribulation, they must preserve absolute normality among the surviving humans, plants and animals, and therefore practice eugenics. The inhabitants of post-apocalypse Labrador have vague knowledge of the "Old People", a technologically advanced civilization they believe was destroyed when God sent " Tribulation" to the world to punish their forebears' sins. It was also adapted for the theatre by playwright David Harrower in 1999. The novel was adapted for BBC radio by Barbara Clegg in 1982, with a further adaptation by Jane Rogers in 2012. An early manuscript version was entitled Time for a Change. It is the least typical of Wyndham's major novels, but regarded by some as his best. The Chrysalids (United States title: Re-Birth) is a science fiction novel by British writer John Wyndham, first published in 1955 by Michael Joseph.
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