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A review by marci_travels
The Women Could Fly by Megan Giddings
challenging
dark
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
This book is an earnest and critical allegory about a dystopian future hurtling towards us. The first chapter is so compelling and so well-written, I immediately moved it to the top of my reading as soon as I brought it home.
Josephine Thomas is 28 years old and single - a combination which does not sit well with the society she resides in. She either needs to get married or register with the government so they can track her activities, her friends, curtail her job, and turn over her money to a man willing to be responsible for her. It sounds like the horror stories my great aunties would tell about the 50s and 60s: a women's paycheck could be picked up by her father, husband, or brother without any recourse if he happened to be the town drunk or irresponsible, farms and businesses couldn't be inherited by daughters only, but the spouse could bleed it dry, women couldn't get a mortgage or credit card in their own name until 1979. It's stories like these and books like this one, and When Women were Dragons (Kelly Barnhill) that make me realize how much we are on a collision course with this same circumscribed life.
My only criticism is there is a sense of menace or violence with every male interaction, and I began to wish for some positive male female behavior that didn't include sex.
Josephine Thomas is 28 years old and single - a combination which does not sit well with the society she resides in. She either needs to get married or register with the government so they can track her activities, her friends, curtail her job, and turn over her money to a man willing to be responsible for her. It sounds like the horror stories my great aunties would tell about the 50s and 60s: a women's paycheck could be picked up by her father, husband, or brother without any recourse if he happened to be the town drunk or irresponsible, farms and businesses couldn't be inherited by daughters only, but the spouse could bleed it dry, women couldn't get a mortgage or credit card in their own name until 1979. It's stories like these and books like this one, and When Women were Dragons (Kelly Barnhill) that make me realize how much we are on a collision course with this same circumscribed life.
My only criticism is there is a sense of menace or violence with every male interaction, and I began to wish for some positive male female behavior that didn't include sex.