In this novel we witness an encounter between Neanderthal people and Homo sapiens. We see the contrast in their minds, language, and view of the world they tragically begin to share.
The Inheritors is a beautifully realised tale about the last days of the Neanderthal people, set in a lush natural world. Seen through the eyes of a small tribe of unforgettable characters, this peaceful existence is threatened by the emergence of Homo sapiens, only half-glimpsed, and barely understood. The struggle between the simple Neanderthals and the malevolent modern humans can have only one outcome, and the reader is left to question their own role in the conclusion.
Golding considered The Inheritors his finest novel and the lead character, Lok, is loosely based on Golding himself and Fa, Lok’s partner is very like Golding’s wife Ann. Golding wrote the first draft in 29 days, shortly after the publication of Lord of the Flies. Sharing similar themes to Lord of the Flies, this is a book about the breakdown of a society, in part as a result of its own weakness. But we are left, at the end of the novel, to contemplate the success of our own species, and the undoubted cost this entails.
If you enjoyed the evocative historical setting of The Inheritors, you might also like Golding’s visionary novel The Spire, a powerful and superbly detailed story set in medieval England. It recounts the process of building a spire on a cathedral, and the costs, material and human, of the task.
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The two people beneath the tree were making noises fiercely as though they were quarrelling. In particular the fat woman had begun...