A gothic and supernatural retelling of Sleeping Beauty where the princess is held captive by her duty and her evil, abusive husband and her sister musA gothic and supernatural retelling of Sleeping Beauty where the princess is held captive by her duty and her evil, abusive husband and her sister must brave trials to learn how to fight for her freedom. The main character princess is stolid, mid-30's, used to manual labor and happier left alone but decides she cannot stand idly by once she knows her sister's fate. This felt modern in it's telling but also reminded me of older fairytales where there are true horrors along the way and not everyone comes through unscathed. This definitely made me a fan of T. Kingfisher though it was a little slow to start after the opening scene. ...more
gonna put some thoughts down since it just lost the Opening Round of the Tournament of Books and while I walked into the reading with a heavy cynical gonna put some thoughts down since it just lost the Opening Round of the Tournament of Books and while I walked into the reading with a heavy cynical chip on my shoulder ('she's just writing this to capitalize on Handmaid fever') - it turned out to pleasantly surprise me. I realized there were several viewpoints I'd been longing for from Handmaid; that of the women supporting the oppressive regime (what were their motivations!? did they regret anything? did they actually get something out of it?) and that of the 1st generation of girls to grow up in the Gilead regime (did they know what they were missing in not learning to read? did it make them easier to brainwash? etc.). This novel delivers both along with a bunch of stuff I didn't ask for or need - e.g. details on how the coup occurs (the hints from Handmaid were scarier and somehow more believable as they were more a gentle slide into martial law rather than an overnight fait accompli... really, no men pick up guns to prevent the widespread arrest of any professional women?!) or a girl's adventure tale of infiltration from Canada despite no obvious aptitude for subterfuge (or listening to one's trainers). Also, she injects a lot of dark humor.
It's fast paced and engaging while Handmaid was introspective and full of dread which made it a very readable (ahem, listenable) book, but provides ample reasons to excuse those who hate on the sequel in favor of the original. It's been likened to fanfic, and really that's mostly what it is, just written by the very steady hand of the original author. I would have preferred this as a story collection from all different points of view, especially as it is supposedly being relayed 100+ years in the future at a historical symposium. That would provide some juicy insights without wrapping things up in a neat bow. Harder to syndicate I suppose (oh, there's that cynicism!) but more in the spirit of continuing the story.
Some of the best, most relevant pieces were those reflecting on the backlash that is always to hand against women stepping into visibility/leadership as well as the default willingness of men to allow other men to be terrible when the perpetrator provides a convenience to themselves & targets only women. There was a lot of subtle commentary on men not seeing crimes against women (and unhappiness with the regime) because it benefits them (oh, and any complainers are of necessity punished) which is oh so relevant today. I am hoping Atwood stops here & doesn't decide to turn this into a trilogy where she suddenly shows the dangers of the #MeToo movement going too far once men are being held accountable because for the moment, she's halfway to redeeming herself in my eyes. (She still owes a better apology than, "I'm sorry if some people felt..." for her shenanigans)
Much latitude is given by those in power to professionals who can relieve them of pain – the doctors, the dentists, the lawyers, the accountants – in the new world of Gilead, as in the old, their sins are frequently forgiven them.
I’m not a natural rule-follower. I roll through stop signs, I swear in public, I lie on online personality tes
So much relevance. Thank you librarians!
I’m not a natural rule-follower. I roll through stop signs, I swear in public, I lie on online personality tests so I get the answers I want (Hermione, Arya Stark, Jo March).
(read for "A Witch’s Guide to Escape: A Practical Compendium of Portal Fantasies" by Alix E. Harrow - for the Hugo short story voting, which it won)...more
Intricate and creepy as usual. Reminded me of nothing so much as Neon Genesis Evangelion in look, feel and apocalyptic monsters.
And I still love thatIntricate and creepy as usual. Reminded me of nothing so much as Neon Genesis Evangelion in look, feel and apocalyptic monsters.
And I still love that the part of Yoda is played by a cat. Make that hundreds of cats of varying degrees of trustworthiness and dark-side served with plenty of cryptic idioms.
No freaking clue where this series is going. Or whether it can possibly satisfy....more
Upon reviewing the lovely quotes I bookmarked, I added a star to this tale. Ms O'Neill make amazing turn of phrases, achingly lovely analogies that I Upon reviewing the lovely quotes I bookmarked, I added a star to this tale. Ms O'Neill make amazing turn of phrases, achingly lovely analogies that I kept bookmarking on the audiofile (and the narrator, by the way, is also great) ...
The clocks ticking sounded like a suicidal man cocking his revolver over and over again.
but I wasn't totally sure if the tale was successful in it's aim.
I cannot discern if the author is a romantic, or a cynic. She says such lovely and horrific things as,
What could be more darling in a woman, than regret?
and simply lovely and inspiration ones as
It was the first time that Poppy had been exposed to art. It changed everything that she knew about physics.
This is, at it's heart, a love-story - one of two orphans with the world against them who create a fantastical world to escape from but ultimately are pulled apart by their methods of coping with the hardships set against them, and it takes place during the Great Depression which is certainly on purpose. There is a ton of horrific content amid the beautiful turns of phrase. I think, perhaps that she is actually saying something about what the press of suffering does differently to men and women and how each adapts (or doesn't) to survive. In that, it is a fairly feminist book - implying that women are somehow hardier and mentally tougher in the face of adversity because they are already born with disadvantages.
She passed a breadline…. It was made up of men, who’s furtive eyes peeked out from the collars of coats they were huddled in. Their hostile eyes were vicious with shame because anyone could look down on them. …. Rose hurried by. Men were taught to have so much pride, to go out in the world and make something of themselves. This Depression was deeply humiliating. Since women were taught that they were worthless, they took poverty and hardship less personally.
In this, I think the author is fairly successful - while the tale is romantic and whimsical in places, it is also steely-eyed and horrible. The ending is mostly perfect (there is a deux ex machina that feels contrived to make a semi-happy ending), particularly in its handling of the abusive Sister Eloise, but that is where it is most problematic as well.
My main nits with this tale is around the massive amount of abuse - sexual of Pierot & physical of Rose - that is really never dealt with. Pierot's is better represented but really not well resolved. Rose's never seems to actually impact her. She is, for example, beaten almost to death by her regular tormentor Sister Eloise but seems to suffer no PTSD or fear of future violence - in fact she becomes perhaps more fearless. In the end, (view spoiler)[ she punishes Sister Eloise not for her own abuse, but for Pierot's. (hide spoiler)] I suppose this could be another signal by the author that women's pain and suffering are 'valued' less than men's and that women are the stronger sex... but it was a miss for me.
-------------------------------- Notes: Longlisted for the Bailey's Prize for Women in Literature.
Chapt 8: Sister Eloise was waiting, and waiting for Rose to make some sort of mistake, to perpetrate an infraction. It usually didn't take very long. You usually had to observe a child for several minutes before they made some sort of ridiculous mistake. What on earth was as flawed and imperfect, as a child? She needed Rose to make a mistake not only to justify to the other children the punishment she was going to rain down on Rose, but to justify it to herself.
Chapt 8:
And an orphanage could not be a happy place. The Mother Superior was of the opinion that Happiness always led to tragedy… There wasn’t a person on this earth who had experienced life on this planet who wouldn’t admit that sin and happiness were bedmates, were inextricably linked. …They were a match made, not in heaven, but in hell. The Mother Superior looked at Rose’s body lying on a raised bed in the infirmary. She was half-conscious, covered in terrible bruises and connected to an intravenous drip. The Mother Superior thought that this was what came from allowing children to consider themselves unique. Or particularly this what happened when you allowed an orphan to think of herself as unique.
Chapt 10:
The clocks ticking sounded like a suicidal man cocking his revolver over and over again.
Chapt 16:
They did not know what on earth to make of this girl. They knew what she was doing was truly magical and they could watch her for hours and hours and hours. But they also felt that she would never make a single penny off it. She certainly seemed crazy but she simultaneously made them think that there was nothing wrong with being a crazy girl and that maybe the world needed a couple more crazy girls.
Chapt 24:
What could be more darling in a woman, than regret?
Chapt 26:
He felt satiated, he had a family, and a mistress and everyone was perfectly happy. If you ever experience such a feeling, you should probably realize that God will take notice. Something, will be taken away.
Chapt 29:
It was the first time that Poppy had been exposed to art. It changed everything that she knew about physics.
Chapt 35:
Everything written by one woman was written by all women… because they all benefited . If one woman was a genius, it was proof that it was possible for all of them. They were not frivolous, they were all Gertrude Stein.
CHapt 44:
Sketches of all her old expressions were visible on her face like rough drafts.
CHapt 48:
She passed a breadline…. It was made up of men, who’s furtive eyes peeked out from the collars of coats they were huddled in. Their hostile eyes were vicious with shame because anyone could look down on them. …. Rose hurried by. Men were taught to have so much pride, to go out in the world and make something of themselves. This Depression was deeply humiliating. Since women were taught that they were worthless, they took poverty and hardship less personally.
Chapt 70:
The best that we can hope for life, is that it is a wonderful Depression.
to add to her excellent review... this had a lot of lovely futuristic details aside from the very excellent soCarol's Review pretty much says it all.
to add to her excellent review... this had a lot of lovely futuristic details aside from the very excellent social commentary such as the lack of mammalian meat the Earthen diaspora accepts as normal, the pixelated 'plants' that everyone seems to have in lieu of actual greenery, the disproportionate love of all things potato-based, the differences in philosophies and behaviors between the "Exodans" (those Earthans who had to evacuate Earth and just headed into space in hope) and the humans from Mars (who had the means to simply abandon earth and set up an alternative terra-formed space in advance of the failure of the planet) and the differences between the species in cloning and 'mod-ing' laws....more
I might return and raise my number of stars... My only complaint really is the distance of the narrator from the humans portrayed. There are "she thouI might return and raise my number of stars... My only complaint really is the distance of the narrator from the humans portrayed. There are "she thought..." "he wanted..." etc. internal insights, but few lines of dialogue or cases of character growth: Instead things happen to people and they either falter or persevere. I blame my discontent on the amazing dialogue of the previous book (Sweetland) which revealed depths of character and shared histories in a few lines of interchange. I miss that here despite the beauty and simplicity of this slim story.
This felt like the best of a folk story: plot driven, a few exceptional rural folks, a touch of magic and a not-necessarily-happy ending. The imagery is the best part of the tale to me; lush, reflective of the inhabitants, and emotionally evocative (more so than the missing dialogue or the terse he/she did something plotting. ). Some of the summary lines are so short and apt they seem like the best kind of comedy --
Perhaps they would be straightforwardly happy with their father consigned to Hell.
or
The moment was so profound for them, it would be almost impossible to remember.
but I suspect I'm seeing more than intended. I have to say, this is beautifully translated. I rarely felt I was missing something, instead it was transporting in the best possible way. This family and neighborhood dynamic could be found in any country but this corner of Indonesia is so well envisioned and described in local words and traditions that it feels familiar by the end despite its location far from home.
Update 12/28 - ok I upped this a star due to all my violent agreement with altTOB comments about what was weird and wonderful about the story: beautiful or stabbing vignettes, great ending (hard to pull off), ongoing theme about Womens' plights... Lots of good stuff in little space. It misses 5 stars due to the distance of the narrator and a Part 1 that doesn't flow as well as the others (so readers, at least get to Part 2!)
update 3/2019 - oh dear. for a 4-star review, I barely remember this tale now 3 years later. Hopefully it still finds some readers. leaving my star rating due to all the things above that I now can't recall. Whereas I vividly remember Sweetland that I mention above from the same reading period (dialogue, characterizations, the plot, even secondary characters)....more
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