Reviewed by CP in 1999. This article may be downloaded, but may not be uploaded or printed elsewhere.

This is the sequel to Ms Russell's remarkable first novel, The Sparrow (1997). Unlike many sequels it is a direct continuation from the earlier book, making in effect a single novel of great complexity and immense length.

The two principal characters from the first novel take leading roles, both having survived, though mutilated by their experiences and thinking the other dead. One of them, Emilio Sandoz, is part of a second mission to the planet Rakhat, and this takes up a large part of the second volume. There is a resolution, uneasy but seemingly definitive, with another sequel probably unlikely.

The story, more than a thousand pages of it in all, is written in muscular, effective English. There is a close attention to personal detail, to the drawing of believable characters, to an intricate time structure stretching in a non-chronological sequence over some eighty years. It is truly epic in scale, with many vivid scenes, immense journeys, human insights and numerous incidents, some of them shocking. There is therefore much in it to like and admire and it is surely destined to become a classic of the genre.

There is also, though, rather a lot to have reservations about. Although it is sf produced at the highest level, for all that it's a conservative kind of sf: another of those stories about people landing on an alien planet and encountering a mystery. Old sf hands will wincingly recall the fad for planetary exploration stories in the 1950s. It is always difficult to invest this kind of story with more than the usual props, to make it, in other words, about something more than looking round an alien planet.

A single example will suffice. Emilio Sandoz (the sparrow, the protagonist) is a linguist. Much is made of this. But the novel says almost nothing about language, or the way in which language can influence meaning. Sandoz is a linguist to help the plot along, to learn the alien language quickly, so his story function is mechanical rather than organic. Russell's strengths as a novelist lie elsewhere: Sandoz turns out to be a memorable human character drawn with great complexity and subtlety.

Children of God is also far too long. There are endless pages of alien ethnology in this: alienness has a fascination, but your appetite for it is quickly satisfied. Your eyes can be excused for glazing over at the sight of all those funny alien names starting with 'Jh' and 'Lj' - apostrophes and capitals scattered at random. And why do science fiction writers tackling religious themes almost invariably pick Jesuits or Jews (in this case both)? It would be refreshing, for a change, to have Quakers or Unitarians going out into the universe and having a crisis over God.

But put the quibbles aside. Little can detract from Russell's substantial achievement with this work. It's science fiction from the heartland, and from the heart.