[1] Gan, the young male Terran chosen by the lead female Tlic, T’Gatoi, accepts his impending fate of being a host for her eggs and offers his body out of love, rage and desperation: "I knew what to do, what to expect.

The story is narrated by Gan, a young boy chosen before birth to carry the eggs of a female Tlic named T'Gatoi.

Gan and his sisters perceive being a host as a privilege; however, their elder brother Qui disagrees, having witnessed an N'Tlic birth when he was young.

Gan's own opinion changes when he is forced to help T'Gatoi perform an emergency cesarean section on a pregnant male N'Tlic named Bram Lomas, who, abandoned by his Tlic, is being eaten alive by his hatched larvae.

She also aimed to depict a human male's experience of pregnancy, including the physical risks and the development of maternal feelings towards his alien offspring.

This resulted in the creation of a story about a loving symbiotic relationship between two very different species, which Butler emphasizes is not about slavery despite some critics' interpretations.

[2] Lastly, Butler wanted to address the theme of "paying the rent" in human emigration into space, and the need for a quid pro quo or "accommodation" rather than repeating colonialist tropes in traditional science fiction.

Specifically, the narrator takes on the role of black female slaves in the United States, who were "forced to carry the offspring of an alien race.

"[9] María Ferrández San Miguel views the relationships between the Terrans and Tlics as a form of continuous traumatic stress (CTS).

[10] Ferrández cites a 2013 article from the Journal of Peace Psychology on CTS research by mental health professionals who investigated the impact of apartheid in South Africa during the 1980s.

The Terrans' residence in the Preserve creates a perceived threat to their survival, leading to a symbiotic relationship between the two species rooted in fear.

Decades after the introduction of a successful cancer cure, it is revealed that the children of its users develop "Duryea-Gode Disease", a dangerous genetic disorder that causes "drift", a dissociative state characterized by violent psychosis and self-harm.

Published in Clarion in 1971.,[1] "Crossover" tells the tale of a lonely woman who is employed in an unsatisfactory factory job and grappling with alcohol dependency.

In the afterword, Butler explains how the characters in "Crossover" were influenced by her old, dull jobs and the strange people she met while doing them, as well as her own fears of failing as a writer.

[1] In "Amnesty", Noah, the main character, meets with prospective human employees for the Communities, an alien species that has taken over Earth's desert areas.

In her afterword to "Amnesty", Butler explains that the story was inspired by Dr. Wen Ho Lee's wrongful imprisonment for espionage by the US government.

Noah, who was considered a traitor and a collaborator, had to endure physical and psychological torture in the hands of the U.S. government because it was willing to act unethically towards humans in order to destroy their enemies.

God shoots down some of her early ideas, explaining the unintended consequences, but Martha ultimately resolves to give people vivid, life-like dreams every night, for a more fulfilling life.

In the afterword to "The Book of Martha", Butler realizes that everyone has a different idea of perfection, making the task from God seemingly impossible.

In it, Butler describes how she became a successful science fiction and fantasy writer against many odds and in great part due to her mother's encouragement.

Next, Butler recounts the effects of her extreme shyness, which was partly brought on by low self-esteem and other children's bullying, and which many adults mistook as slowness.

Butler concludes the piece by noting that now that she is a successful science fiction and fantasy writer, she is often interrogated on the usefulness of her writing to black people; for her, the answer to this constant questioning is obvious: science fiction as a genre that proposes alternative realities and behaviors, discusses the potential consequences of scientific and technological progress, and critiques socio-political organization, may allow blacks to imagine themselves as other than they have been defined by American society and history.

Janet St. John concluded that "although this book is little 'compact' in size, its ideas are splendidly large" and that "Butler's imagination is strong --- so is her awareness of how to work real issues subtly into the text of her fiction.

"[20] Janet St. John saw Butler as "making writing a habit," and she supplemented our understanding of that with "her first hand analysis and discussion of the impetus and influence in her own work".

[19] She explained that the "enlightening" and "inspirational" afterwords that follow each story or novella contain "a refreshing look into Butler's writing process and helps to clarify what excites and motivates."

As Gerald Jonas of The New York Times views it, "Bloodchild and other stories is a fine example of how science fiction, by subverting expectations, can jar us into a new appreciation of familiar truths.