The Legacy of Heorot - Themes

Themes

The story is largely concerned with the struggle for supremacy between humans and grendels, and more generally with the relationship between humans and our natural environment. The Avalon colonists inadvertently worsen their own predicament with their first attempts to rid the island of grendels, because they failed to fully understand the grendels' role in the local ecosystem. The book demonstrates that nature is a complex web of interdependent species, which human intervention can easily disrupt with unpredictable results. This is a theme also explored in Jurassic Park.

The book also draws from some of Robert A. Heinlein's work involving the adage "if you desire peace, prepare for war," in exploring the conflict between the civilian leadership of the colony who see no danger, and the military advisor who believes that danger always exists in the future. Cadmann is successively treated as crackpot, savior, scapegoat, and hero as the needs of the colony for his talents change.

Finally, the book explores the social dynamics of a situation where nobody can trust anybody else's judgement, not even their own. The eventual outcome of this is more fully detailed in the sequel, Beowulf's Children.

Larry Niven
Novels and short-story collections
Known Space
  • World of Ptavvs
  • A Gift from Earth
  • Neutron Star
  • The Shape of Space
  • Protector
  • Tales of Known Space
  • Flatlander
  • The Patchwork Girl
  • Crashlander
Ringworld
  • Ringworld
  • The Ringworld Engineers
  • Guide to Larry Niven's Ringworld
  • The Ringworld Throne
  • Ringworld's Children
Man-Kzin Wars
  • Man-Kzin Wars
  • Man-Kzin Wars II
  • Man-Kzin Wars III
  • Man-Kzin Wars IV
  • Man-Kzin Wars V
  • Man-Kzin Wars VI
  • Man-Kzin Wars VII
  • Man-Kzin Wars VIII: Choosing Names
  • Man-Kzin Wars IX
  • Man-Kzin Wars X: The Wunder War
  • Man-Kzin Wars XI
  • Destiny's Forge
  • Man-Kzin Wars XII
  • Man-Kzin Wars XIII
Fleet of Worlds
  • Fleet of Worlds
  • Juggler of Worlds
  • Destroyer of Worlds
  • Betrayer of Worlds
The Magic Goes
Away
The Warlock
  • Not Long before the End
  • What Good Is a Glass Dagger?
  • The Magic Goes Away
  • The Magic May Return
  • More Magic
  • The Time of the Warlock
Golden Road
  • The Burning City
  • Burning Tower
  • Burning Mountain
Written with
Jerry Pournelle
  • Inferno
  • Lucifer's Hammer
  • Oath of Fealty
  • Footfall
  • Escape from Hell
Moties
  • The Mote in God's Eye
  • The Gripping Hand
  • Outies
Heorot
  • The Legacy of Heorot
  • Beowulf's Children
  • Destiny's Road
Dream Park
  • Dream Park
  • The Barsoom Project
  • The California Voodoo Game
  • The Descent of Anansi
  • Achilles' Choice
  • Saturn's Race
  • The Moon Maze Game
The State
  • A World Out of Time
  • The Integral Trees
  • The Smoke Ring
Other co-authored
novels
  • The Flying Sorcerers
  • Berserker Base
  • Fallen Angels
  • Rainbow Mars
  • Building Harlequin's Moon
Other collections
  • All the Myriad Ways
  • The Flight of the Horse
  • Inconstant Moon
  • A Hole in Space
  • Convergent Series
  • Niven's Laws
  • Limits
  • N-Space
  • Playgrounds of the Mind
  • Bridging the Galaxies
  • Scatterbrain
  • Larry Niven Short Stories Volume 1
  • Larry Niven Short Stories Volume 2
  • Larry Niven Short Stories Volume 3
  • The Draco Tavern
  • Stars and Gods
  • The Best of Larry Niven
Adapted as comics
  • Death by Ecstasy (1991)
  • Green Lantern: Ganthet's Tale
  • The Magic Goes Away
  • "Not Long before the End"
  • "All the Myriad Ways"
Collections by Niven or others. With Edward M. Lerner. With Jerry Pournelle. Set in the CoDominium series. With Steven Barnes.
Selected short stories and novellas
  • "At the Core"
  • "Bordered in Black"
  • "The Borderland of Sol"
  • "Death by Ecstasy"
  • "The Defenseless Dead"
  • "Flash Crowd"
  • "Flatlander"
  • "Grendel"
  • "The Handicapped"
  • "The Hole Man" "Inconstant Moon"
  • "The Jigsaw Man"
  • "The Magic Goes Away"
  • "Neutron Star"
  • "Procrustes"
  • "The Return of William Proxmire"
  • "The Soft Weapon"
Essays
  • Niven's laws
  • "Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex"
  • "The Theory and Practice of Time Travel"

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