# Sins of the Children by Adrian Tchaikovsky

9 Hacker News commenters recommended Sins of the Children by Adrian Tchaikovsky and 1 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 2 of 13 months.

**Verdict:** Readers praise its alien concepts and engaging writing in this short story, though one found the long paragraphs boring and another called it more fantasy than science fiction.

## Why people recommend it

- Strong concepts and engaging writing (3 comments): "But the concepts and writing are excellent... really engaging stuff." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46671681)) "This was a terrific short story." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46672342)) "this excellent short story" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48340708))
- Vividly alien, fascinating creatures (2 comments): "Good science fiction where the aliens are very alien are hard to come by." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46670852)) "The elephant's dad was such a fascinating creature" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46671609))

## What people warn about

- Long paragraphs felt boring (1 comments): "somehow this one with the waaay too long paragraphs seemed... Unnecessarily boring?" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46671834))
- Missing a human element (1 comments): "I also missed a human part of it." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46672082))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [The Last Question by Isaac Asimov](https://hackerapproved.com/p/last-question.md): 50 recommend
- [There Will Come Soft Rains by Ray Bradbury](https://hackerapproved.com/p/there-will-come-soft-rains.md): 27 recommend
- [They're Made Out of Meat by Terry Bisson](https://hackerapproved.com/p/they-re-made-out-of-meat.md): 17 recommend
- [Lena by qntm](https://hackerapproved.com/p/lena.md): 16 recommend
- [The Machine Stops by E. M. Forster](https://hackerapproved.com/p/machine-stops.md): 15 recommend

## Where to get it

- [See price on Amazon](https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Sins+of+the+Children+by+Adrian+Tchaikovsky&tag=hackerapprove-20) (affiliate link)

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "Sins of the Children by Adrian Tchaikovsky", https://hackerapproved.com/p/sins-of-the-children/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).