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A review by katykelly
Femlandia by Christina Dalcher
5.0
Close to home, dark, chilling and another excellent gender-centred dystopia.
A little bit of The Road, and a large dollop of Dalcher's female-centred near-future hellish situations.
She always manages to make me shut the pages and give thanks for the imperfect yet vastly superior present to the one she vividly brings to life.
This slightly more complex story begins with the fairly swift collapse of society, a novel in itself, but puts within this the mother (Miranda) and daughter (and also the THEME of mothers and daughters) fighting to find somewhere safe as the world tears itself to pieces around them as the economy implodes.
And the only option? The cultish woman-only refuge of Femlandia, created by Miranda's cold, tour-de-force of a mother decades before. Which has its own rules, hierarchy and politics. And of course secrets.
Oh so dark, I listened to this as an audiobook and was chilled with the turns the story takes, it reminded me of how I felt reading Naomi Alderman's The Power, what can happen when there is a large gender imbalance, what humans can be capable of.
But. You can't deny the author's methods of drawing in a reader, of consuming them in a frightening world and narrative, and toying with their emotions... she's now a favourite of mine.
This won't give you many chuckles (though there is dark humour here in spades), but it's thrilling and scary stuff. Insightful, deep and surely bound for a screen some time soon?
I audio-read a lot of this, and the voice of Miranda, youthful enough yet motherly and strong suited the first person voice, I wanted to continue listening long past the end of each chapter. Easy to follow as an audio-read, and the additional narratives from other characters added background and slowed things down for context, leaving me wanting to know more of what was happening.
Come on men, don't just leave these titles for women - I want to talk about them with you!
With thanks to Nudge Books for providing a sample Audible copy, and the publisher for the Netgalley reading copy.
A little bit of The Road, and a large dollop of Dalcher's female-centred near-future hellish situations.
She always manages to make me shut the pages and give thanks for the imperfect yet vastly superior present to the one she vividly brings to life.
This slightly more complex story begins with the fairly swift collapse of society, a novel in itself, but puts within this the mother (Miranda) and daughter (and also the THEME of mothers and daughters) fighting to find somewhere safe as the world tears itself to pieces around them as the economy implodes.
And the only option? The cultish woman-only refuge of Femlandia, created by Miranda's cold, tour-de-force of a mother decades before. Which has its own rules, hierarchy and politics. And of course secrets.
Oh so dark, I listened to this as an audiobook and was chilled with the turns the story takes, it reminded me of how I felt reading Naomi Alderman's The Power, what can happen when there is a large gender imbalance, what humans can be capable of.
But. You can't deny the author's methods of drawing in a reader, of consuming them in a frightening world and narrative, and toying with their emotions... she's now a favourite of mine.
This won't give you many chuckles (though there is dark humour here in spades), but it's thrilling and scary stuff. Insightful, deep and surely bound for a screen some time soon?
I audio-read a lot of this, and the voice of Miranda, youthful enough yet motherly and strong suited the first person voice, I wanted to continue listening long past the end of each chapter. Easy to follow as an audio-read, and the additional narratives from other characters added background and slowed things down for context, leaving me wanting to know more of what was happening.
Come on men, don't just leave these titles for women - I want to talk about them with you!
With thanks to Nudge Books for providing a sample Audible copy, and the publisher for the Netgalley reading copy.