Science fiction has long been given the alternative moniker of “speculative fiction” due to its grounding in conjecturing the nature of changing trends in science and technology and its effects on human life, culture, evolution, etc.  But the further in the future such speculation goes, the less likely it is to hold a connection to anything that we recognize.  Such works as Gene Wolfe’s Book of the New Sun and Jack Vance’s Dying Earth present worlds millions to perhaps billions of years removed from our own, where immense amounts of scientific, cultural, and even evolutionary change has passed over an equally immense course of time, resulting in worlds that are utterly alien to us in a way that apples are compared to jackfruit.

Nevertheless, despite how far removed a tale may be from eras that we are familiar with, if the concepts that it centers around remain central to the story, it can still give a glimpse of surprising possible developments of these concepts far down the road, such as what has been done in Haldane B. Doyle’s fascinating far-future series, Our Vitreous Womb. 

Taking place on an Earth of some 30,000 years in the future, the world of this series is nearly unrecognizable from our own. It is built in one of the most organic ways that any reader will experience, through the limited knowledge, experiences and worldviews of each book’s focal character. It excels at putting together a universe with blocks of context over exposition and creating an absolutely vital process for telling each tale in the order it is released. 

The first book, Her Unbound Hallux provides the most human perspective of this future world, where biological technology has rendered our age of machines all but obsolete.  But the true reason for this is mostly veiled in Doyle’s first outing, due to the limited perspective of the nevertheless insatiably curious Miobeth Anabasi. Anabasi desires to know more about the world outside of the privileges and responsibilities of her being an “Alate,” a caste of humans given lives of luxury and privilege for nebulous reasons.  It is this curiosity and constant disregard for responsibility that enrages and ultimately alienates Miobeth from her taciturn mother. But an attraction to a low-ranking “Crefter” who sparks her fascination and desire, leads her discover the true nature of things.  It is a process that frees her from her gilded cage in one way, but merely exchanges it for another, in spite of acquiring all that she at first longed for. 

Events in this first book create a staging ground for everything after, anchoring it all in a very human perspective, but preparing the reader for the decidedly alien viewpoint of the next three books. The next three books shift their focus to the enigmatic Ostrals, of which the reader receives only fleeting interactions with in Miobeth’s story.  Her Lethal Secretions introduces the voluptuous and perpetually dissatisfied Lanella at war with her nurturing and aggressive sides, leading to an event that ostracizes her from her community. She seeks redemption through an opportunity of a lifetime: a chance to found a community of her own after successfully serving as wetnurse to a human infant in the household of Miobeth’s now quite unstable mother, weathering the culture shock of exchanging her own predictable life for the chaos of humans. She can only commiserate with her only true confidante: the still very young Oji, Miobeth’s forlorn son of mixed Alate and Crefter heritage. Over time, more demands are made of her, making her dreams seem farther and farther away. 

From this tale’s bittersweet end, Oji becomes a primary character of the remaining two books.  In Her Pellucid Pupil, he finds a friend in Suvita, an Ostral tasked with compiling ancient texts in a land far away from her subterranean home. Afflicted with a genetic anomaly that renders her unable to reproduce, she reluctantly chooses this life over the voluntary suicide that she would have customarily committed for her perceived uselessness. Forced by circumstance, she becomes the wife and closest friend of Oji in a coastal Crefter community, finding a kindred spirit with him as two lonely souls, but with a relationship that is both asexual and doomed to tragedy.

Oji’s story concludes in His Indelible Fingerprint. Here, Remus, an Ostral envoy who was betrayed by another whom he loved, finds meaning and purpose in his life once again. He does this after rescuing the cowardly Oji from certain death and discovering a fascinating genetic trait that he possesses—one that would aid all Ostrals in ultimate victory against their Slave Empire enemies. This sets them on a journey to found their own community in hopes that in spite of how most Ostrals see humanity as “subhuman,” they can convince them of his invaluable importance. 

The biological wonders that Ostral society creates, using living creatures that clean, analyze, heal and perform all manner of machine-like tasks, integrate themselves into a world where the biological truly has subsumed circuit and steel. All these things, combined with the Ostrals’ complete lack of a fear of death, choosing to end their own lives after they feel that they have achieved their purpose to its fullest, serve, in the end, to keep their society healthy, constantly evolving, and unified as one against the Slave Empires whom they are at constant war with, and yet, share a startling connection to all at once. In fact, the Ostrals’ dependence on such intricate “biotech” and their own functions that make themselves part of a superorganism, are certain to give strong recollections of the alien Oankali from Octavia E. Butler’s fantastic Xenogenesis trilogy.  But rather than emphasizing their alieness, Doyle invites the reader to see the Ostrals as the next step in human evolution that they truly are, never forgetting to anchor the reader with a human to give both perspective and juxtaposition in the tales that each book offers. 

Moreover, similar to how Ostral society, with their “cell” communities, devote themselves to highly specific tasks that together serve their kind as a whole in the manner of the aforementioned superorganism, each book in this series with their individual tales from widely differing perspectives, flows into the whole, telling an integrated overarching story.

One final thing: considering the bittersweet and often sad nature of each book’s ending, it becomes clear that Doyle is somewhat less than a fan of “happy” endings.  But tale is nevertheless one that is thought-provoking and lingers in the back of the mind for days after, and the methodology of the building of this almost alien, and yet in many ways relatable distant future world is something that a reader looking for a truly unique hard sci-fi tale truly needs to experience.  It instils such a keen in what will happen next, that most will crave the next book in spite of their somber tone.  And fortunately, after sharing a rapport with the author in question, it is heartening to learn that Doyle is not yet finished with his outings to the world of the Ostrals and their effect on this Earth of the future, and the results of Oji’s contribution to their civilization. 

Our Vitreous Womb is a series that is both inspiring and one that I encourage any reader with an eye for the truly unique to pick up. 

8/10; well recommended