Review by becksbecks - Westward Women

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becksbecks 's review for:

Westward Women by Alice Martin

4.5

adventurous emotional tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

I am so impressed this is a debut novel, and look forward to whatever Alice Martin comes up with next. The book follows Aimee (written in third person), Eve (third person), and Teenie (first person) on their westward journeys. Additionally, intermittent second person chapters break up the story and end up connecting later, which I found really interesting and well executed.

This novel is not “hard” science fiction, as the mechanics for the sickness affecting only women and its cure are never fully developed, so if you are not the type to suspend belief for the sake of the story, this is not the novel for you. The book takes place in the real world of the 70s. Women, and not the greater society, are on the brink of collapse. And as the infection spreads to affect hundreds of thousands, society reacts to these restless women by arresting and sedating them.

Westward Women does not deal with the everyday or overt oppression of women front and center, but rather alludes to it through interactions, memories, and news broadcasts. Instead, the book dives into how women have shaped themselves because of and despite familiar and societal pressure and expectations and explores their interpersonal relationships with strangers, family, and other westward women. The characters are impressively complicated and messy. Not everyone gets sick, and not everyone who is sick wants to be cured.

Overall, I found Westward Women to be a captivating and unique novel. I did not expect the horror/thriller aspects when starting, but I think they helped keep the story engaging when it otherwise might have dragged a bit with constant interpersonal relations. I struggled with the conclusion, but in the end I think it makes sense with the story being told.

I received an eARC from St. Martin’s Press through NetGalley.

“The woman scoffed at her silence. ‘As if you’re the only person who itches,’ she said before she walked away. ‘The rest of us have just learned to live with it.’”

“They didn’t scratch to get it out. They didn’t necessarily want it out at all.”

Content Warnings