Margaret Atwood does it again

Margaret Atwood returns to the dystopia she created in Oryx and Crake in her latest novel, The Year of the Flood.  This time she follows the stories of two women, but employs the same technique of jumping back and forth in time which was so effective in the first novel.

Here we have two women caught up in the God's Gardeners movement -- a group fighting against the corporations which have taken over the planet.  We see them before the pandemic as they struggle with life in this nightmare scenario and after -- perhaps just as nightmarish, or perhaps not.

I loved this book so much, that I immediately reread Oryx and Crake when I finished it.  Since one is not a sequel to the other, but a retelling from a different perspective, you could read them in whichever order you chose, but I might recommend reading Oryx and Crake first for reasons I don't want to mention here for fear of giving away too much. 

I literally could not put these two books down and would highly recommend both of them.

Comments

[Jo]

I'm really looking forward to reading this - I loved Oryx and Crake and am a big fan of dystopic novels. Right now I'm about 30th of the waitlist at the library.

[MOG]

Yes, Atwood definitely delivers with this one. I thought Oryx and Crake was a bit more esoteric and I think a re-read after this might clarify some things for me.