I’m going to have a really hard time reviewing this book, because it’s so damn grim. It’s also hard to full describe what the book is about without running into spoilers. So, first, I’ll just try and describe the plot. This book is set in a world where a great disaster has somehow destroyed most things outside an island community of people who now live in an extremely structured, patriarchal society. Men function in their assigned roles based on their names and what men with […]
Well, that was disappointing
After I finished The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, I immediately got the sequel, The Book of Etta. I knew going in that it was not a direct sequel: it doesn’t take place immediately after the end of Midwife, but instead picks up decades later, in a new burgeoning civilization after the apocalyptic events of the first book. So I wasn’t disappointed about that. However, this book was a rare experience for me: a piece of media that has an ending so weak, it makes […]
The Road Meets the Handmaid’s Tale
I don’t know why I keep reading post-apocalyptic books, especially when it already feels like the beginnings of some kind of apocalypse are upon us. And especially since, as a cynical and angry feminist, I know what a world-ending event that led to lawlessness would mean to the experience of women. So really, I should have known that I would find a book that explores just that emotionally devastating. But it was worth the devastation and the read. The Book of the Unnamed Midwife explores […]
Two Good Coming Out YA Novels
When I was a teenager, a young adult book is part of what helped me come out. The book was Am I Blue, a collection of LGBT short stories, and at the time I devoured any LGBT themed YA book I could get my hands on, from the legitimately good to the soapy mediocrity of Nancy Garden. I’ve kept up interest in that genre of novels into adulthood, and every time I see a queer YA novel that looks like it might be good, I […]