Not as good as "Dawn" but still a very compelling read.

In the chronology of the Patternist books, this is the first book, but it was the last to be written. If I could do it over again, I would read the books in the order they were written rather than the order of the story. Octavia Butler clearly matured as a writer or at least developed her ideas for this series by the time she got tow writing Wild Seed. It's the best of the Patternist books.