Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang

infobox Book |
name = Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang
title_orig =
translator =


image_caption = Cover of first edition (hardcover)
author = Kate Wilhelm
illustrator =
cover_artist = M. C. Escher
country = United States
language = English
series =
genre = Science fiction novel
publisher = Harper & Row
release_date = 1976
english_release_date =
media_type = Print (Hardcover & Paperback)
pages = 207 pp
isbn = ISBN 0-060-14654-0
preceded_by =
followed_by = "Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang" is a science fiction novel by Kate Wilhelm, published in 1976. Parts of it appeared in Orbit 15 in 1974. It was the recipient of the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1977, and was nominated for the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1976. The title of the book is a quotation from William Shakespeare's Sonnet 73.

Plot summary

Massive environmental changes and global disease, attributed to large-scale pollution, cause the collapse of civilization around the world. One large, well-to-do extended family sets up an isolated community. However, as the death toll mounts (due to a variety of causes) the family begins cloning themselves to survive. When the clones come of-age, they reject the idea of sexual reproduction in favor of further cloning. The original members of the community, too old and outnumbered by the clones to resist, are forced to accept the new social order.

As time passes, the new generations of clones are weaker (physically and mentally) than their predecessors. Towards the end, the community is found to have been wiped out entirely due to natural disasters, but mainly by the destruction to the mill, which had been the energy source the community had depended on to survive. Only a few select people had survived, and among them was a man named Mark, who had foreseen the death of the community and had prepared for it.