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hdbblog's review against another edition
3.0
So, a book with a very pretty cover showed up at my door unannounced. It shouted A Girl Undone at me from that cover, and enticed me to read it. Alas, what this book didn't tell me was that it was a sequel in disguise. So, of course, I dutifully went to the library and checked out the first book in this series, A Girl Called Fearless. I was intrigued. The story promised me a dystopian world rife with male power. A world where women were objects, instead of people. The feminist in me was overjoyed. The reader who has been burned by many a dystopia lately, was not. Now that I've actually finished this book, I'm sad to say that I'm still a fence-sitter. While this definitely wasn't exactly what I was hoping for it to be, it wasn't too bad of a story either. Settle in, and I'll explain.
I think the number one thing that first threw me off, was Avie. Our main character, Avie is a very privileged and sheltered young woman. This means, of course, that she truly believes that her life is the absolute worst, and that the world is hell bent on making her miserable. To be honest, I wasn't all that happy with her at the beginning of this story. I felt for her, to be sure. No woman wants to be owned, and especially by someone as cold and menacing as the man who wants her. However, the more that Avie prolonged her decision, the more that she whined and didn't act, the more I wanted to throw something at her. I just wanted her to choose. Good or bad, I just wanted her to choose.
Luckily, as the story went on, Avie and I understood one another more. The more of the outside world she was exposed to, the more her eyes were opened to the lives of others. When she finally started to realize how selfish she was being, and quit being so whiny, we got along loads better. If only, and you probably all knew this was coming, there hadn't been that pesky romance to get in the way of her growth.
See, A Girl Called Fearless pulls very heavily from the whole Romeo and Juliet trope. Two people who fate tries to keep apart, struggling mightily to be together. I'm not against romance. I welcome it, if it feeds the story line. In this case, Yates and Avie never felt real to me. Yates felt like an easy way to show that Avie had to give up so much to finally do something about her life. I'm sure she loved him, but it didn't show in the writing. Instead, it just fed the concept of her being selfish. So many times she made decisions that benefited her, and put others at risk. It drove me mad.
So what kept me reading on? Mainly, the fact that there is so much action pushing this book forward. The world itself really intrigued me as well. Catherine Linka leaves things on the precipice. Avie's who universe is on the brink of collapse. Who wouldn't want to know what happens next? Yes, I will be reading the next book. I only hope our lovely heroine maintains her character development, and gets to kicking some ass.
I think the number one thing that first threw me off, was Avie. Our main character, Avie is a very privileged and sheltered young woman. This means, of course, that she truly believes that her life is the absolute worst, and that the world is hell bent on making her miserable. To be honest, I wasn't all that happy with her at the beginning of this story. I felt for her, to be sure. No woman wants to be owned, and especially by someone as cold and menacing as the man who wants her. However, the more that Avie prolonged her decision, the more that she whined and didn't act, the more I wanted to throw something at her. I just wanted her to choose. Good or bad, I just wanted her to choose.
Luckily, as the story went on, Avie and I understood one another more. The more of the outside world she was exposed to, the more her eyes were opened to the lives of others. When she finally started to realize how selfish she was being, and quit being so whiny, we got along loads better. If only, and you probably all knew this was coming, there hadn't been that pesky romance to get in the way of her growth.
See, A Girl Called Fearless pulls very heavily from the whole Romeo and Juliet trope. Two people who fate tries to keep apart, struggling mightily to be together. I'm not against romance. I welcome it, if it feeds the story line. In this case, Yates and Avie never felt real to me. Yates felt like an easy way to show that Avie had to give up so much to finally do something about her life. I'm sure she loved him, but it didn't show in the writing. Instead, it just fed the concept of her being selfish. So many times she made decisions that benefited her, and put others at risk. It drove me mad.
So what kept me reading on? Mainly, the fact that there is so much action pushing this book forward. The world itself really intrigued me as well. Catherine Linka leaves things on the precipice. Avie's who universe is on the brink of collapse. Who wouldn't want to know what happens next? Yes, I will be reading the next book. I only hope our lovely heroine maintains her character development, and gets to kicking some ass.
rachd24's review against another edition
4.0
I really enjoyed this dystopian read. Set in the near-future, women are a commodity that are bought and sold, after a cancer-crisis wipes out a huge percentage of the female population.
For my full review of A Girl Called Fearless, visit Confessions of a Book Geek here - http://confessionsofabookgeek.wordpress.com/2014/04/25/review-a-girl-called-fearless/
I received this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. This in no way impacts on my views or opinions of this book.
For my full review of A Girl Called Fearless, visit Confessions of a Book Geek here - http://confessionsofabookgeek.wordpress.com/2014/04/25/review-a-girl-called-fearless/
I received this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. This in no way impacts on my views or opinions of this book.
rattledragons's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
inspiring
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
tropic_anaaa's review against another edition
4.0
This book was honestly amazing. It had the perfect mixture of tragedy, drama, action, AND romance. You can't help but feel sympathy towards Avie's situation--her father sells her to save his company. I fell in love with the setting, a dystopian United States in the present. This story makes you really think, too. What would happen if something like this really happen?
Overall, I thought everything about this book was wonderful, especially the characters. A colourful array of characters liven the dark plot, and optimism radiates from all the characters. The only thing I disliked was how long it took for Avie to really stand up for herself and run away from the arranged marriage her father had placed her in.
I received this book in a Goodreads giveaway.
Overall, I thought everything about this book was wonderful, especially the characters. A colourful array of characters liven the dark plot, and optimism radiates from all the characters. The only thing I disliked was how long it took for Avie to really stand up for herself and run away from the arranged marriage her father had placed her in.
I received this book in a Goodreads giveaway.
allysonbogie's review against another edition
5.0
Aveline (Avie) lives in Southern California in a time when most girls are under 20 or over 60. A synthetic hormone in beef caused ovarian cancer, killing 50 million American women about ten years before the book is set. Girls and women of childbearing age have become a commodity and a group called the Paternalists is taking over control of government and society. Girls can be sold to husbands when they turn 16 and then begin having babies, to make sure that society is repopulated. Wealthy girls like Avie have bodyguards and are closely protected by their families, and usually forbidden from interacting with boys their age. Avie's life reaches a turning point and she has to decide who she is and what she stands for.
This is an engaging, well-written, unique book. A Girl Called Fearless is a total page-turner but also makes some very thought-provoking points. The descriptions are very vivid and there are parts that are scary or suspenseful enough that I had to stop reading it before bed. Aveline is a complex protagonist and I like that she has moments of basically saying that she doesn't care about the revolution and she just cares about love. This is more honest and makes it less of a purely political book. I highly recommend it to adults and teens alike, and will order it for my middle school (7th and 8th grade) library and book talk it to older/more mature readers. I'm very excited for the sequel, a Girl Undone, coming out June 25, 2015.
This is an engaging, well-written, unique book. A Girl Called Fearless is a total page-turner but also makes some very thought-provoking points. The descriptions are very vivid and there are parts that are scary or suspenseful enough that I had to stop reading it before bed. Aveline is a complex protagonist and I like that she has moments of basically saying that she doesn't care about the revolution and she just cares about love. This is more honest and makes it less of a purely political book. I highly recommend it to adults and teens alike, and will order it for my middle school (7th and 8th grade) library and book talk it to older/more mature readers. I'm very excited for the sequel, a Girl Undone, coming out June 25, 2015.
maggiemaggio's review against another edition
4.0
4.25 stars
Did you ever read a book that's not based on reality, but seems so real that it makes you angry and keeps you up at night thinking about it? I've come across a few books like this in my life and bravo to Catherine Linka because A Girl Called Fearless is another one that I can add to the list. Also, this was one of my most anticipated reads of 2014 and I'm happy to say it lived up to expectations!
Many people know that food issues are near and dear to my heart, I'm going to school to be a registered dietician and, even before I started that journey, I was a big advocate for natural, whole foods. Looking at the typical American diet this isn't something that matters to many people, but even though something like Scarpanol, the hormone that's the impetus for the story in A Girl Called Fearless, isn't real, it very easily could be. The story takes place in the present day, but in the early 2000s women in the United States began dying in massive numbers from cancer. The cancer itself was aggressive, but the bigger problem was that there wasn't enough chemotherapy and other medical treatments to care for the sheer volume of women who were sick. The epidemic was eventually traced back to Scarpanol, a hormone that the United States approved for use in cattle without testing it properly.
Avie, the story's main character is a victim of Scarpanol, not in the sense that she got sick or died, but because she's a survivor and is now left to deal with the aftermath. Avie's mother, and pretty much all the women in her generation are gone (long time vegans and vegetarians survived) and women are now so rare they're treated as precious commodities. Avie, an only child, comes from a wealthy family so she has a full-time bodyguard and is never allowed outside on her own. Less well off women aren't so lucky with many being kidnapped and essentially sold into sexual slavery. Avie looks forward to the day she can go to college and have more freedom, but then women are barred from higher education with colleges claiming they can't adequately keep women safe. Avie's only other choice at that point is to get married and, with her father's business in trouble, she's contracted (pretty much sold) to a wealthy older politician for $50 million.
Once Avie has been contracted she needs to make a decision about what to do and there are pretty much only two decisions available to her: go through with the marriage or run away to Canada, where they are willing to harbor women trying to escape contractual marriage. Avie doesn't want to go through with the marriage, especially when she meets her betrothed Jessop Hawkins who is a leader in the "Paternalist" movement, but running is dangerous and she doesn't know if she can do it. Yates, a childhood friend, urges her to go. His sister's marriage ended badly and Yates has dedicated his life to working for the underground movement trying to help women escape. Even though Yates and Avie haven't been able to interact much in recent years they still care about each other deeply and maybe even love each other.
A Girl Called Fearless is pretty much fraught with tension. I forced myself to put it down around 12:30am one night, but I could have easily stayed up until 3 or 4am reading. I kept trying to tell myself that it was highly unlikely that the story would end up with Avie married to Hawkins, but I still was almost in a near panic while reading. (Sidenote: I kept picturing this as a New Adult book where Avie marries the creepy, older Hawkins, he indoctrinates her into married life (i.e. sex) which she becomes a fiend for, and then she slowly changes his mind over time and he helps her free women and they live happily ever after.)
Major props to Catherine Linka for not being after to go to some dark and creepy places. The whole idea of the Paternalist movement is terrifying, girls' cell phones are restricted, girls aren't allowed to interact with boys their own age or really any men outside of their family, and the Paternalists want to take away women's right to vote, but there was so much more on top of that. A common clause in the marriage contracts are that girls need to be virgins and Avie goes through a virginity check which also includes the doctor telling her that no matter how many times a day her husband wants sex she has to go along with it (the whole idea is to repopulate society). Linka also isn't afraid to kill and hurt characters and force Avie to make tough decisions. And then there's the whole second half of the book which I could have never imagined, and at first I was skeptical, but I came to really like the way it played out.
The writing here is strong, the story is unique, and the characters are complex and brought out a whole range of emotions in me, but what really got to me about this story was how real it could be. As I said above the American diet is killing us, maybe not directly by a poisonous hormone, but indirectly by things heart-disease or diabetes. And there's no reason something more direct couldn't happen. The rest of the story is terrifyingly real as well. In the book there are politicians plotting to take away people's rights and fear-mongering at pretty much every turn. Women might seem like we're ok in the United States now, but what about reproductive health rights or equal pay? And what about the rights of African-Americans, Latinos, and gays? I was raised to question everything and not be complacent and this book is a great reminder of that.
That said, as much as I liked the idea for this story, the world Catherine Linka created, and the interpersonal relationships, I couldn't fully get behind the times when Avie seemed to have some effect on society as whole. It's not that I didn't think she personally could, it's more that in the world Linka created one teenage girl's ability to have a real impact seemed like such a slim possibility. I did very much enjoy this book as whole, but it was strongest when it focused on Avie, the world in which she lived, and her interactions with the people around her.
Bottom Line: Avie's story and the world Catherina Linka created made for one of my favorite reads of 2014 so far. The idea of a hormone used on cattle killing women and the Paternalistic movement were both frighteningly real and made for a quick-paced, nail-biting story. Plus, Avie is a great heroine who I challenge you not to root for. A Girl Called Fearless is the best of both worlds: an interesting, compelling story that also makes you think about the world we live in.
(Edited to add: Catherine Linka left a comment saying that there will be a sequel to A Girl Called Fearless involving Avie. She left a little teaser , but I won't put that here in case anyone doesn't want to see it)
I received an electronic review cope of this book from the publisher via NetGalley (thank you!). All opinions are my own.
This review first appeared on my blog.
Did you ever read a book that's not based on reality, but seems so real that it makes you angry and keeps you up at night thinking about it? I've come across a few books like this in my life and bravo to Catherine Linka because A Girl Called Fearless is another one that I can add to the list. Also, this was one of my most anticipated reads of 2014 and I'm happy to say it lived up to expectations!
Many people know that food issues are near and dear to my heart, I'm going to school to be a registered dietician and, even before I started that journey, I was a big advocate for natural, whole foods. Looking at the typical American diet this isn't something that matters to many people, but even though something like Scarpanol, the hormone that's the impetus for the story in A Girl Called Fearless, isn't real, it very easily could be. The story takes place in the present day, but in the early 2000s women in the United States began dying in massive numbers from cancer. The cancer itself was aggressive, but the bigger problem was that there wasn't enough chemotherapy and other medical treatments to care for the sheer volume of women who were sick. The epidemic was eventually traced back to Scarpanol, a hormone that the United States approved for use in cattle without testing it properly.
Avie, the story's main character is a victim of Scarpanol, not in the sense that she got sick or died, but because she's a survivor and is now left to deal with the aftermath. Avie's mother, and pretty much all the women in her generation are gone (long time vegans and vegetarians survived) and women are now so rare they're treated as precious commodities. Avie, an only child, comes from a wealthy family so she has a full-time bodyguard and is never allowed outside on her own. Less well off women aren't so lucky with many being kidnapped and essentially sold into sexual slavery. Avie looks forward to the day she can go to college and have more freedom, but then women are barred from higher education with colleges claiming they can't adequately keep women safe. Avie's only other choice at that point is to get married and, with her father's business in trouble, she's contracted (pretty much sold) to a wealthy older politician for $50 million.
Once Avie has been contracted she needs to make a decision about what to do and there are pretty much only two decisions available to her: go through with the marriage or run away to Canada, where they are willing to harbor women trying to escape contractual marriage. Avie doesn't want to go through with the marriage, especially when she meets her betrothed Jessop Hawkins who is a leader in the "Paternalist" movement, but running is dangerous and she doesn't know if she can do it. Yates, a childhood friend, urges her to go. His sister's marriage ended badly and Yates has dedicated his life to working for the underground movement trying to help women escape. Even though Yates and Avie haven't been able to interact much in recent years they still care about each other deeply and maybe even love each other.
A Girl Called Fearless is pretty much fraught with tension. I forced myself to put it down around 12:30am one night, but I could have easily stayed up until 3 or 4am reading. I kept trying to tell myself that it was highly unlikely that the story would end up with Avie married to Hawkins, but I still was almost in a near panic while reading. (Sidenote: I kept picturing this as a New Adult book where Avie marries the creepy, older Hawkins, he indoctrinates her into married life (i.e. sex) which she becomes a fiend for, and then she slowly changes his mind over time and he helps her free women and they live happily ever after.)
Major props to Catherine Linka for not being after to go to some dark and creepy places. The whole idea of the Paternalist movement is terrifying, girls' cell phones are restricted, girls aren't allowed to interact with boys their own age or really any men outside of their family, and the Paternalists want to take away women's right to vote, but there was so much more on top of that. A common clause in the marriage contracts are that girls need to be virgins and Avie goes through a virginity check which also includes the doctor telling her that no matter how many times a day her husband wants sex she has to go along with it (the whole idea is to repopulate society). Linka also isn't afraid to kill and hurt characters and force Avie to make tough decisions. And then there's the whole second half of the book which I could have never imagined, and at first I was skeptical, but I came to really like the way it played out.
The writing here is strong, the story is unique, and the characters are complex and brought out a whole range of emotions in me, but what really got to me about this story was how real it could be. As I said above the American diet is killing us, maybe not directly by a poisonous hormone, but indirectly by things heart-disease or diabetes. And there's no reason something more direct couldn't happen. The rest of the story is terrifyingly real as well. In the book there are politicians plotting to take away people's rights and fear-mongering at pretty much every turn. Women might seem like we're ok in the United States now, but what about reproductive health rights or equal pay? And what about the rights of African-Americans, Latinos, and gays? I was raised to question everything and not be complacent and this book is a great reminder of that.
That said, as much as I liked the idea for this story, the world Catherine Linka created, and the interpersonal relationships, I couldn't fully get behind the times when Avie seemed to have some effect on society as whole. It's not that I didn't think she personally could, it's more that in the world Linka created one teenage girl's ability to have a real impact seemed like such a slim possibility. I did very much enjoy this book as whole, but it was strongest when it focused on Avie, the world in which she lived, and her interactions with the people around her.
Bottom Line: Avie's story and the world Catherina Linka created made for one of my favorite reads of 2014 so far. The idea of a hormone used on cattle killing women and the Paternalistic movement were both frighteningly real and made for a quick-paced, nail-biting story. Plus, Avie is a great heroine who I challenge you not to root for. A Girl Called Fearless is the best of both worlds: an interesting, compelling story that also makes you think about the world we live in.
(Edited to add: Catherine Linka left a comment saying that there will be a sequel to A Girl Called Fearless involving Avie. She left a little teaser , but I won't put that here in case anyone doesn't want to see it)
I received an electronic review cope of this book from the publisher via NetGalley (thank you!). All opinions are my own.
This review first appeared on my blog.
bizzybee429's review against another edition
1.0
Is Yates a first name or a last name? I don't even know.
silea's review against another edition
2.0
90% nonsense, 10% terrifying.
Very early in the book, it's made clear that the death of women was more or less limited to the US. Millions of women died, a horrifying loss, but on the scale of a world with 7-odd billion people, it's pretty small. The idea that the US economy would collapse, that women would be bought and sold, is just ridiculous. Mail-Order Brides are already a thing now, immigrant domestics are already common. Why on earth would the US devolve to a state where women became a fashion accessory for only the richest of men?
And what happened to the post-menopausal women in government? Sure, they're a minority at every level, but they do exist.
And what about the vegetarians and others who don't eat beef? A quick internet search suggests that between 5 and 15 million americans are vegetarian, pescetarian, or otherwise limit their meat consumption. Further, the majority of those are women. So that's probably 3-10 million women who would have survived, even if the cancer was 100% fatal for women who ate even a single bite of beef.
So yes, there would be a lot fewer most-menarche-pre-menopause women in the US, but between immigration (legal and otherwise) and the survivors, it would not have been the sausage party the book describes.
I really just couldn't get into the book. It was so laughably impossible for the country to have ended up the way it did, and everything else hinges on it.
But, if somehow the US did end up with a dramatic deficit of women, if for some reason women from other countries weren't rewarded for emigrating after the crisis, then you come to the terrifying part. Because if the premise wasn't so laughably flawed, if the author had explained why this was a worldwide phenomenon instead of specifically making it a US problem, i do believe that young women would start being sold as property to the highest bidder, and the author made that prospect as horrifying as possible.
Very early in the book, it's made clear that the death of women was more or less limited to the US. Millions of women died, a horrifying loss, but on the scale of a world with 7-odd billion people, it's pretty small. The idea that the US economy would collapse, that women would be bought and sold, is just ridiculous. Mail-Order Brides are already a thing now, immigrant domestics are already common. Why on earth would the US devolve to a state where women became a fashion accessory for only the richest of men?
And what happened to the post-menopausal women in government? Sure, they're a minority at every level, but they do exist.
And what about the vegetarians and others who don't eat beef? A quick internet search suggests that between 5 and 15 million americans are vegetarian, pescetarian, or otherwise limit their meat consumption. Further, the majority of those are women. So that's probably 3-10 million women who would have survived, even if the cancer was 100% fatal for women who ate even a single bite of beef.
So yes, there would be a lot fewer most-menarche-pre-menopause women in the US, but between immigration (legal and otherwise) and the survivors, it would not have been the sausage party the book describes.
I really just couldn't get into the book. It was so laughably impossible for the country to have ended up the way it did, and everything else hinges on it.
But, if somehow the US did end up with a dramatic deficit of women, if for some reason women from other countries weren't rewarded for emigrating after the crisis, then you come to the terrifying part. Because if the premise wasn't so laughably flawed, if the author had explained why this was a worldwide phenomenon instead of specifically making it a US problem, i do believe that young women would start being sold as property to the highest bidder, and the author made that prospect as horrifying as possible.
liralen's review against another edition
2.0
'It's over. Aveline is under contract to me. She belongs to me. Do you understand?' (page 155)
I was sitting in a food court once, reading, when I overheard a conversation at the table next to me. A (young) man was telling a (young) woman -- presumably his girlfriend -- not to listen to her family or friends, that she belonged to him. 'You belong to me.' And I hoped so fervently that she would find a way to leave him, because that doesn't even begin to approximate a healthy relationship model. I still hope she left him.
But back to the book. Aveline -- Avie -- lives in a version of the U.S. where most of the adult female population died off about ten years ago. A synthetic hormone in beef targeted anyone between puberty and menopause, basically, leaving the young, the old, the vegetarian (hurray, I'm safe), and those who had previously had their reproductive organs removed. (And also the anorexics, apparently? It's an offhand comment (page 144, because I'm obsessive like that), but it doesn't make any sense -- just because your body isn't producing hormones, if indeed it isn't, doesn't mean that it doesn't respond to hormones. Unless it's that the synthetic screws with estrogen, except that men have estrogen too...) Now women, and girls-not-yet-women, are at a premium -- literally. They're bought and sold like commodities, and Avie's desperate to escape her Contract.
Which is where Hawkins -- the source of that oh-so-lovely quotation up top -- comes in. Hawkins is rich. Powerful. Conservative -- he's a driving power behind the movement to strip women of as many of their rights as possible. And oh yes, just to prove that he's really, truly, irredeemably slimy, he wants his future wife to look just like his mother, because apparently he gets off on that. Not exactly a character to have depth. (By the by, I can't believe.)
At some point I decided that I was going to have to cut Avie some slack: yes, she does a lot of really idiotic things -- like lose her resolve to play her cards close to the chest every time Hawkins says something offensive -- but then, she's seventeen. She's been raised by a wealthy father with the means to provide her with a bodyguard(-slash-jailer) and a private school education; this would be a very different book if she'd grown up in a different neighbourhood (more on that in a moment). What frustrates me about her, though, it that she doesn't do a ton of growth in that respect. She grows, yes. She figures out how to take a stand and do the right thing. But she also gives away her position (and puts dozens or more others at risk), decides to 'stop lying', tells anyone who wants to know what her name is and that she's running from a Contract and that she's trying to get to Canada -- and then is genuinely surprised when people know who she is. (Her knowledge has some weird gaps, though -- first she doesn't even know who the Taliban are, which, given the time frame of this book, I doubt -- and later she seems perfectly familiar with the Taliban, Al Qaeda, etc.)
So Avie's status as one of the privileged...okay. Getting into the bigger problem I had with this book: worldbuilding. Namely, there isn't much of it. I suppose it's fair to expect that Avie would have been isolated from some of the effects of half the working population dying, since she's in an extremely privileged position. But despite all we hear of economic collapse and devastation and so on, we never see any of those effects. Other than a lot of the guys in the book being creepers and bodyguards being the latest fashion accessory, we see very few indications that Avie can't do anything she was able to do before the hormone.
Other than vague comments about some countries wanting to close borders to the U.S., we hear almost nothing about the international response. Believe me, if almost the entire female population of a country, especially one as powerful as the U.S., died, there would be consequences. Borders would have been closed long ago -- it took them years to figure out the problem! Other countries wouldn't want to risk it spreading. And since women have become open commodities -- literally auctioned off through (currently very respectable) houses like Sotheby's and Christie's -- wouldn't men in the U.S. also, oh, try to go somewhere else? Or, appallingly but fittingly for this book, try to bring in women from places like India? (For that matter, why didn't the women in the U.S. try to go somewhere else while they could?) For that matter, why didn't any other countries try to invade? Seriously, how is the U.S. still functioning enough in this book to maintain any credible international power?
It's just, it's been ten years. Ten years. Yes, a lot can happen in ten years. A huge amount. But enough to turn a huge proportion of men into giant slimeballs? Enough to allow for the legal commodification of women? I don't think so. The Paternalists are so uniformly slimy that it's just not creditable. Take the VP: 'I've committed to continuing our efforts to segregate the sexes and to deny federal contracts to companies that employ women. We don't have to put that into law. We can just let federal agencies know it's our unwritten policy. Of course, once the Twenty-eighth Amendment passes, we can do whatever we want.' (page 218)
I don't believe that kind of misogyny develops over ten years. There are a boatload of politicians whose policies I think are appalling, but I also understand (...to some degree...) that they're doing what they think is right for the country. Meanwhile, the Paternalists are just trying to put down women. There's no mention of religion for them (religion is only ever mentioned in a positive context), or of purpose beyond repression, or, well, of anything good whatsoever.
I could go on in this vein for a really long time -- I took fairly extensive notes, and clearly I have opinions. But let's just look at the other two main males of the book: the love interest and the father.
The love interest: Look, I'm not a romantic. I'd be happier without any love interest at all. But because that's never going to happen in this kind of book (see also, for books this is very reminiscent of, [b:Wither|8525590|Wither (The Chemical Garden, #1)|Lauren DeStefano|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1341532430s/8525590.jpg|13392566] and [b:XVI|6933141|XVI (XVI, #1)|Julia Karr|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1277846885s/6933141.jpg|7164525]), I'll just say this: 1) you've barely spoken in years. You don't know each other well enough to be in love. 2) Romeo and Juliet is a really terrible relationship model, guys. Spoiler: they both die. Also, they are hormone-happy kids; also, Romeo is arguably bipolar or depressed.
Her father: Is either an idiot or is just a really terrible father. I have a really, really hard time believing that so many fathers have bought into the Paternalist model in such a short period of time (and girls have obviously been auctioned and Contracted off for at least the last few years, making the amount of time to misogyny that much shorter), but Avie's father? He doesn't even read her Contract, apparently. He's thrown a redemptive bone near the end, but not one that helps much.
At this point I've probably outgrown this kind of book anyway. Recommended for those who loved Wither and its ilk; recommended for those who like to shout at their books and turn down every other corner and take compulsive notes; not recommended for those who care about things like worldbuilding and plausibility.
Edited to fix a typo.
I received a free copy of this book via a Goodreads giveaway.
I was sitting in a food court once, reading, when I overheard a conversation at the table next to me. A (young) man was telling a (young) woman -- presumably his girlfriend -- not to listen to her family or friends, that she belonged to him. 'You belong to me.' And I hoped so fervently that she would find a way to leave him, because that doesn't even begin to approximate a healthy relationship model. I still hope she left him.
But back to the book. Aveline -- Avie -- lives in a version of the U.S. where most of the adult female population died off about ten years ago. A synthetic hormone in beef targeted anyone between puberty and menopause, basically, leaving the young, the old, the vegetarian (hurray, I'm safe), and those who had previously had their reproductive organs removed. (And also the anorexics, apparently? It's an offhand comment (page 144, because I'm obsessive like that), but it doesn't make any sense -- just because your body isn't producing hormones, if indeed it isn't, doesn't mean that it doesn't respond to hormones. Unless it's that the synthetic screws with estrogen, except that men have estrogen too...) Now women, and girls-not-yet-women, are at a premium -- literally. They're bought and sold like commodities, and Avie's desperate to escape her Contract.
Which is where Hawkins -- the source of that oh-so-lovely quotation up top -- comes in. Hawkins is rich. Powerful. Conservative -- he's a driving power behind the movement to strip women of as many of their rights as possible. And oh yes, just to prove that he's really, truly, irredeemably slimy, he wants his future wife to look just like his mother, because apparently he gets off on that. Not exactly a character to have depth. (By the by, I can't believe
Spoiler
that 'Love Bracelet' didn't have trackers in itAt some point I decided that I was going to have to cut Avie some slack: yes, she does a lot of really idiotic things -- like lose her resolve to play her cards close to the chest every time Hawkins says something offensive -- but then, she's seventeen. She's been raised by a wealthy father with the means to provide her with a bodyguard(-slash-jailer) and a private school education; this would be a very different book if she'd grown up in a different neighbourhood (more on that in a moment). What frustrates me about her, though, it that she doesn't do a ton of growth in that respect. She grows, yes. She figures out how to take a stand and do the right thing. But she also gives away her position (and puts dozens or more others at risk), decides to 'stop lying', tells anyone who wants to know what her name is and that she's running from a Contract and that she's trying to get to Canada -- and then is genuinely surprised when people know who she is. (Her knowledge has some weird gaps, though -- first she doesn't even know who the Taliban are, which, given the time frame of this book, I doubt -- and later she seems perfectly familiar with the Taliban, Al Qaeda, etc.)
So Avie's status as one of the privileged...okay. Getting into the bigger problem I had with this book: worldbuilding. Namely, there isn't much of it. I suppose it's fair to expect that Avie would have been isolated from some of the effects of half the working population dying, since she's in an extremely privileged position. But despite all we hear of economic collapse and devastation and so on, we never see any of those effects. Other than a lot of the guys in the book being creepers and bodyguards being the latest fashion accessory, we see very few indications that Avie can't do anything she was able to do before the hormone.
Other than vague comments about some countries wanting to close borders to the U.S., we hear almost nothing about the international response. Believe me, if almost the entire female population of a country, especially one as powerful as the U.S., died, there would be consequences. Borders would have been closed long ago -- it took them years to figure out the problem! Other countries wouldn't want to risk it spreading. And since women have become open commodities -- literally auctioned off through (currently very respectable) houses like Sotheby's and Christie's -- wouldn't men in the U.S. also, oh, try to go somewhere else? Or, appallingly but fittingly for this book, try to bring in women from places like India? (For that matter, why didn't the women in the U.S. try to go somewhere else while they could?) For that matter, why didn't any other countries try to invade? Seriously, how is the U.S. still functioning enough in this book to maintain any credible international power?
It's just, it's been ten years. Ten years. Yes, a lot can happen in ten years. A huge amount. But enough to turn a huge proportion of men into giant slimeballs? Enough to allow for the legal commodification of women? I don't think so. The Paternalists are so uniformly slimy that it's just not creditable. Take the VP: 'I've committed to continuing our efforts to segregate the sexes and to deny federal contracts to companies that employ women. We don't have to put that into law. We can just let federal agencies know it's our unwritten policy. Of course, once the Twenty-eighth Amendment passes, we can do whatever we want.' (page 218)
I don't believe that kind of misogyny develops over ten years. There are a boatload of politicians whose policies I think are appalling, but I also understand (...to some degree...) that they're doing what they think is right for the country. Meanwhile, the Paternalists are just trying to put down women. There's no mention of religion for them (religion is only ever mentioned in a positive context), or of purpose beyond repression, or, well, of anything good whatsoever.
I could go on in this vein for a really long time -- I took fairly extensive notes, and clearly I have opinions. But let's just look at the other two main males of the book: the love interest and the father.
The love interest: Look, I'm not a romantic. I'd be happier without any love interest at all. But because that's never going to happen in this kind of book (see also, for books this is very reminiscent of, [b:Wither|8525590|Wither (The Chemical Garden, #1)|Lauren DeStefano|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1341532430s/8525590.jpg|13392566] and [b:XVI|6933141|XVI (XVI, #1)|Julia Karr|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1277846885s/6933141.jpg|7164525]), I'll just say this: 1) you've barely spoken in years. You don't know each other well enough to be in love. 2) Romeo and Juliet is a really terrible relationship model, guys. Spoiler: they both die. Also, they are hormone-happy kids; also, Romeo is arguably bipolar or depressed.
Her father: Is either an idiot or is just a really terrible father. I have a really, really hard time believing that so many fathers have bought into the Paternalist model in such a short period of time (and girls have obviously been auctioned and Contracted off for at least the last few years, making the amount of time to misogyny that much shorter), but Avie's father? He doesn't even read her Contract, apparently. He's thrown a redemptive bone near the end, but not one that helps much.
At this point I've probably outgrown this kind of book anyway. Recommended for those who loved Wither and its ilk; recommended for those who like to shout at their books and turn down every other corner and take compulsive notes; not recommended for those who care about things like worldbuilding and plausibility.
Edited to fix a typo.
I received a free copy of this book via a Goodreads giveaway.
grace05's review
adventurous
dark
tense
medium-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? No
3.5