The Founders’ Legacy is a book about gender equality, a thought experiment about what it might look like. It is a work of the imagination. It is a new future SF novel with themes of romance but it can also be read as a young adult gender queer book because it features teenaged genderless humans and their relationship with exploring gender and puberty. It also uses reverse metaphors in how it presents society.
The book cover blurb is…
The Founders created them free and equal.
In the domed habitat of Frequil, sixteen-year-old Tal 455 is now an adult. Like every sihem—a genderless human engineered by the Founders—Tal has been raised to value harmony and the collective good, where every citizen has a place.
When Tal proposes an experiential history machine to explore Frequil’s origins, the ruling council reluctantly approves it under strict supervision. Paired with Gen 456, a certified genius, Tal begins uncovering fragments of the Founders’ world that were never meant to be seen.
Hidden among the archives are stories of men and women living in a society with different rules. Fascinated, Tal and Gen use their machine to experience a forbidden past—and begin questioning everything they have been taught about themselves.
They were created to be equal…not different.
File under YA/SF Gender queer
Focus Questions
Some focus questions for readers. I will add to these as I think of more and do feel free to tell me some of your questions.
Single non-gendered pronouns
What observations do you make about the use of non-gendered pronouns?
How did they make your head feel?
Were they hard to read?
Did you substitute he and she in your head as you read?
A non-gendered person
If you were to try and write a non-gendered person what emotions would you leave and what would you leave out?
Do you think gender underpins who you are as a human being?
What would you find difficult about writing a person who has no gender?
Society
Do you think the society we live is is unequal because of gender?
Do you think gender should be used as a basis for judging people, their skills, their talents, their jobs?
Do you think society promotes rules of behaviour? Are these good or bad?
What do think culture wars are? How do you feel about this?
What do you think are the essential elements of a free and equal society?
Romance
Do you think the use of old romance novels worked as a way of exploring gender differences?
Do you think the feminist themes within the romance novel elements were valid? Such as sexual harrassment?
Did you have any comments on the romantic relationship developing between Tal and Gen?
Donna Maree Hanson, Author, Phd in Creative Writing 