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zelbel2016 's review for:
Future Home of the Living God
by Louise Erdrich
This book felt like a "less dark" twist on The Handmaiden's Tale.
Of course, I suppose it's hard to say that there is a "less dark" dystopia because this certainly is a dystopia. I simply felt like there was more time for meditation on the actual events taking place, perhaps because our narrator Cedar Songmaker is writing down the events taking place for her unborn child.
This story is the story of what happens when the world starts moving backward. Cedar is four-months pregnant with her first child, created with a lover from within her Catholic Church Phil when the world starts to fall apart.
Though the reader doesn't know it straight away, babies are being born less evolved than their parents. Animals and plants are following a similar pattern. In an attempt to save the human race, the government starts removing pregnant women from their homes, locking them away in hospitals to monitor their pregnancies.
Cedar is caught in the middle of this. After meeting her biological mother, Cedar goes into hiding and is helped by her lover. She is discovered and removed to a hospital. There she forms unlikely friendships and learns the exact depths she - a the child of two liberals turned Catholic - will go to protect her unborn and potentially unsavable child.
This is a beautifully written book that focuses on how far a mother will go for her child. There are rich themes of religion and evolution and how the two can exist side by side. While I say that this reminds me of The Handmaiden's tale, mainly because of its focus on reproductive rights, I didn't mean it as an insult. I meant it as praise. This book is unique in itself. Erdrich weaves a wonderful story of human emotion and love, both biological and adoptive, and explores exactly what humans will do when the beauty of the world is threatened.
Of course, I suppose it's hard to say that there is a "less dark" dystopia because this certainly is a dystopia. I simply felt like there was more time for meditation on the actual events taking place, perhaps because our narrator Cedar Songmaker is writing down the events taking place for her unborn child.
This story is the story of what happens when the world starts moving backward. Cedar is four-months pregnant with her first child, created with a lover from within her Catholic Church Phil when the world starts to fall apart.
Though the reader doesn't know it straight away, babies are being born less evolved than their parents. Animals and plants are following a similar pattern. In an attempt to save the human race, the government starts removing pregnant women from their homes, locking them away in hospitals to monitor their pregnancies.
Cedar is caught in the middle of this. After meeting her biological mother, Cedar goes into hiding and is helped by her lover. She is discovered and removed to a hospital. There she forms unlikely friendships and learns the exact depths she - a the child of two liberals turned Catholic - will go to protect her unborn and potentially unsavable child.
This is a beautifully written book that focuses on how far a mother will go for her child. There are rich themes of religion and evolution and how the two can exist side by side. While I say that this reminds me of The Handmaiden's tale, mainly because of its focus on reproductive rights, I didn't mean it as an insult. I meant it as praise. This book is unique in itself. Erdrich weaves a wonderful story of human emotion and love, both biological and adoptive, and explores exactly what humans will do when the beauty of the world is threatened.