330 reviews for:

Lady Oracle

Margaret Atwood

3.65 AVERAGE


Okay, this is more like a 3.5. I didn't like it as much as The Robber Bride or The Blind Assassin, which are both 4/5 so I felt bad giving it that, but I definitely liked it more than a fair few books I've rated 3 so??? Sliding scale.

This isn't a review, whatever.
taxidermies's profile picture

taxidermies's review

4.5
dark emotional reflective tense fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

A good book, but not a great book. A fascinating tale of a woman who writes "lurid Gothics" in her spare time, becomes a fraud of a poet overnight and fakes her own death to escape her multiple, bizarre affairs (including one with a man named, I kid you not, the Royal Porcupine).

Somehow, Atwood manages to make this sound a lot less zany than it comes off. The ending has an unresolved quality that is very symptomatic (I feel) of Atwood's earlier novels. A brilliant read, flaws and all.

The story wasn't going one way, it was going between the child struggling with obesity and a bit cruel mother, the weight- losing teen/young woman, the mistress by accident, the married woman, the cliche writer, the mistress again, the dead woman... you can't know which Joan -or even Joan at all- you're reading about.

Nevertheless, Margaret Atwood is an amazing writer and her style is so charming.
emotional funny mysterious reflective tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
dark emotional funny reflective slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
challenging emotional medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
mysterious reflective slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

summerrain's review

1.0

Just really couldn't get into it.
reflective medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes