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3.9 AVERAGE
3.9 AVERAGE
This was good. It was not a gripping-can't-put-it-down story, but it was very enjoyable, and raised some very interesting questions about family and what it means to be human. I really enjoyed the parallel story lines. The world is really well built as well, as bits and pieces are revealed quite naturally as part of the story line. I also really liked the added touch that there's clearly more to the world than is revealed in the story - there are passing references to an undeciphered "message from Europa" which don't influence the plot at all, but do make the world seem more complete.
Spoiler
I am not sure I found the bit where Shira was recruited by Y-S nearly 10 years ago to be implanted as a spy at some point the future very convincing though. It seems too long-game and too unpredictable a strategy to be really useful. I was really hoping it was going to turn out that her work was so important for something that they'd hired her basically to prevent anyone else from getting to it.
4.5 stars. Read it as a book-club book and was pleasantly surprised. Very thought-provoking and some very good/fascinating characters.
How to describe this book... hmmmm... (pondering with fingertip to lips!)
Okay, let's just 'out with it'. It's a romance novel between a woman and a robot. Ya, you heard me right. It wasn't as naughty as I had anticipated (which was a pleasant surprise), and the author kept the nasty language to a minimum, so I was happily able to finish reading the whole book. I enjoyed it completely! Okay, so I skipped a couple love scenes and missed entirely every paragraph relating to the 'Golem' story on the side (thanks to all those who's previous comments on GoodReads saved me from that ponderous storyline). The remainder of the book was interesting, complex at times, and I actually really enjoyed the fact that this was not a YA fiction novel (which I've been immersed in for the past few months!).
I'll definately be looking up this author to see what else she has written.
Okay, let's just 'out with it'. It's a romance novel between a woman and a robot. Ya, you heard me right. It wasn't as naughty as I had anticipated (which was a pleasant surprise), and the author kept the nasty language to a minimum, so I was happily able to finish reading the whole book. I enjoyed it completely! Okay, so I skipped a couple love scenes and missed entirely every paragraph relating to the 'Golem' story on the side (thanks to all those who's previous comments on GoodReads saved me from that ponderous storyline). The remainder of the book was interesting, complex at times, and I actually really enjoyed the fact that this was not a YA fiction novel (which I've been immersed in for the past few months!).
I'll definately be looking up this author to see what else she has written.
The last chapters of this book make me want to give it more than a 3, but the first long haul, and the fact that I often found myself, in the middle, wishing that I could read about other characters living in the same world, means I can't in good faith give it any more. Maybe a 3.5.
I really enjoyed how the book ended, although it did feel just a little bit underwhelming. This was really a glorified romance novel, but it was a well-handled one, with queer representation and interesting characters, as well as good moral dilemmas. I guess I just couldn't get in to Shira's head; some of her was startlingly familiar and simultaneously completely alien.
I would not read this again, but I would recommend it to others, just to see what they think. Definitely worth a read, but not a favorite.
I really enjoyed how the book ended, although it did feel just a little bit underwhelming. This was really a glorified romance novel, but it was a well-handled one, with queer representation and interesting characters, as well as good moral dilemmas. I guess I just couldn't get in to Shira's head; some of her was startlingly familiar and simultaneously completely alien.
I would not read this again, but I would recommend it to others, just to see what they think. Definitely worth a read, but not a favorite.
Despite the fact that I can only think of bad things to say about the book, I actually liked it. The first few chapters feature all that is wrong with science fiction; the world-building is done in a highly-irritating, data-dump manner. But after that things settle in for a while. And then basically the last 75 to 100 pages are on total cruise control. Somehow I ended up enjoying it, though, if only for the historical story of the golem that makes up about 5% of the novel.
This is a reprint of a 1991 book, I believe, that at once feels old and new. It has that sense of female-authored 1970s SF about it. The main character, Shira, is working for a 'multi-corp' in the 22nd century, in midst of a divorce when her son is taken off her, awarded to her ex and they are sent far away. She resigns from the multi-corp and goes back home to Tivka, the Jewish free town where she grew up, to the grandmother who raised her, and a new job training an illegal cyborg. Hijinks ensue.
Ahem. So it's rather more complicated than that. As Shira's story progresses, dealing with old loves, missing her son, the ramifications of what makes a cyborg a person or not, the multi-corps trying to hack into free towns and so on, we also get chapters of the grandmother telling the cyborg a story of the Maharal in Prague, making a golem in the 16th century.
It's an 'interesting' book. I found the first chapter compelling, then it slowed right down for me. It took until I was about 40 per cent in to feel really dragged into the story. It's very female focused and all the main female characters are differentiated really well. The men less so, perhaps, Yod the cyborg aside. I'm glad I read it.
Ahem. So it's rather more complicated than that. As Shira's story progresses, dealing with old loves, missing her son, the ramifications of what makes a cyborg a person or not, the multi-corps trying to hack into free towns and so on, we also get chapters of the grandmother telling the cyborg a story of the Maharal in Prague, making a golem in the 16th century.
It's an 'interesting' book. I found the first chapter compelling, then it slowed right down for me. It took until I was about 40 per cent in to feel really dragged into the story. It's very female focused and all the main female characters are differentiated really well. The men less so, perhaps, Yod the cyborg aside. I'm glad I read it.
This book made my "Top 10 Best Books I read in the Peace Corps" list. I first read it in 1996. Twenty years later, it sustains delight on second reading. I love the way Piercy melds dystopian and utopian elements and past and future settings in this novel (see also Woman on the Edge of Time).
Writers, read this for: Structure. He, She and It shifts between the stories of a cyborg intelligence seeking his humanity in a cyberpunk future and a golem suffering the same crisis in Prague in 1600. Quite brilliant.
Pairs well with: Don't make the mistake I did in 1996 and read only one work by Piercy. Keep going. Her novel Woman on the Edge of Time is a must read as well as her collection of essays and poetry My Life, My Body.
Notable: After reading these works and rereading He, She and It, I named Marge Piercy my own author of the year in 2015.
Also, the character Malkah is a thoughtful, older woman of the type that I dearly love in life and fiction.
Quotable:
"Now her life felt like a crystalline structure shattered into bright dangerous shards that left her bleeding."
"She felt as if she were seventeen again, ignorant, fearful, a creature all gusty emotions and pain."
Writers, read this for: Structure. He, She and It shifts between the stories of a cyborg intelligence seeking his humanity in a cyberpunk future and a golem suffering the same crisis in Prague in 1600. Quite brilliant.
Pairs well with: Don't make the mistake I did in 1996 and read only one work by Piercy. Keep going. Her novel Woman on the Edge of Time is a must read as well as her collection of essays and poetry My Life, My Body.
Notable: After reading these works and rereading He, She and It, I named Marge Piercy my own author of the year in 2015.
Also, the character Malkah is a thoughtful, older woman of the type that I dearly love in life and fiction.
Quotable:
"Now her life felt like a crystalline structure shattered into bright dangerous shards that left her bleeding."
"She felt as if she were seventeen again, ignorant, fearful, a creature all gusty emotions and pain."
adventurous
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This book took an exceptionally long time for me to read. I started it in August, hopeful of it being good based on the premise presented on the cover, and found myself distracted enough to finish several other books first.
The setting is an interesting dystopian world run primarily by large, multi-national corporations. I also liked the setup of the conflict between the multis and the "free towns".
As for characters themselves, I never really connected with Shira, nor with any of the others. Something about them always kept them at a distance from me, like I could never be more than a casual, outside observer. Thus, I had trouble buying into their stories.
I also felt like a significant part of the story was inaccessible to me due to my significant lack of knowledge of Judaism. There were MANY references made that I had to pause to look up. Eventually, I got tired of doing this and just plowed through the remainder of the book. I'm sure there were many meaningful things I missed out on by doing this.
On an intellectual level, there were some interesting historical factoids interspersed mainly throughout the Joseph Golem story. Also, puzzling over the point where Yod stops being machine and starts being human is an interesting dilemma.
As an overall science fiction novel, I did not feel myself get swept away by the story. For anyone looking for a dystopian science fiction novel with a feminist slant, I would be more likely to recommend "The Handmaid's Tale" by Margaret Atwood.
The setting is an interesting dystopian world run primarily by large, multi-national corporations. I also liked the setup of the conflict between the multis and the "free towns".
As for characters themselves, I never really connected with Shira, nor with any of the others. Something about them always kept them at a distance from me, like I could never be more than a casual, outside observer. Thus, I had trouble buying into their stories.
I also felt like a significant part of the story was inaccessible to me due to my significant lack of knowledge of Judaism. There were MANY references made that I had to pause to look up. Eventually, I got tired of doing this and just plowed through the remainder of the book. I'm sure there were many meaningful things I missed out on by doing this.
On an intellectual level, there were some interesting historical factoids interspersed mainly throughout the Joseph Golem story. Also, puzzling over the point where Yod stops being machine and starts being human is an interesting dilemma.
As an overall science fiction novel, I did not feel myself get swept away by the story. For anyone looking for a dystopian science fiction novel with a feminist slant, I would be more likely to recommend "The Handmaid's Tale" by Margaret Atwood.