The Synthetic Man
Originally The Dreaming Jewels

Theodore Sturgeon

11/19/2004

When Horty is 9, he runs away from his adopted, abusive parents. Appearances were extremely important to the Bluetts, and Horton does not fit the proper mold. He runs away before they can call the police and try to put him back in an orphanage. Shortly outside the town where he lives, he finds some people who will help him. They are midgets in a traveling carney. He is renamed Kiddo and becomes part of the carney act.

Kiddo lives with Zena and pretends to be a girl. They look similar and their singing complements each other. Zena takes over Kiddo's education. She is constantly giving him books to read from classic novels to higher level physics. Kiddo absorbs them all with eagerness. He enjoys living in the carney, and quickly is accepted. Zena has warned him to never show the hand that was mutilated by Mr. Bluett to anyone, and to avoid the headmaster of the show, Maneater.

Kiddo stays with the carney for ten years or so. Then Zena tells him its time for him to leave. Although a midget, with the midget's fear of the real world, he leaves, returning to the area where he lived before he ran away.

A few years later a young woman who Kiddo had known when he was 9 is being harassed by Judge Bluett. A stranger, the guitar player at the bar where she has to meet Bluett, gives her money and tells her to run away. She takes the next train out of town. The next night, someone who looks like her meets the lecherous Judge and gives the old man the fright of his life. Bluett is reminded of the boy that had lived with him and his wife many years ago. He started nosing around and was able to determine that Horton had joined the traveling carnival. He seeks out Maneater for more information.

But Maneater has his own agenda. He hates all people. He has been looking for someone like Kiddo all his life, not knowing the person lived right under his nose. Now he wants to get Kiddo back. Then he believes he will have to power to dispose of mankind. Zena, and ultimately Kiddo, have to fight Maneater back.

This classic science fiction author, Theodore Sturgeon, has an interesting premise with The Synthetic Man. Horty is human, but not, hence the title. We are given clues about his physiology but don't know what actually happened to him after half way through the book. The original book was published over 50 years ago. It only shows its age in little things, like the carney itself. The type of traveling carnivals now are very different than the freak shows that traveled around the United States in the 40's and 50's. But Horty's story doesn't age. The writing is average, yet the storyline held my interest. Bluett and Maneater are wickedly bad to the extreme. Horty's and Zena's characters are well rounded.

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