The Great American Read: Day 86 The Handmaid's Tale

Back in March of this year (2018) my Popsugar Reading Group voted to read The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood for the prompt "book about feminism".  I personally wouldn't label it that way.  It certainly has feminists up in arms and it is a classic of speculation and dystopian world building, but it was not a favorite book of mine and I don't think I learned anything specifically about "feminism".  I listened to it on audio so I am not sure if reading it would be more helpful.  Unlike so many women who love this book, I could not find it very believable.  Plus the ending was such a cop out.  I wasn't moved.  I didn't feel like it was a "warning".  I understand women are oppressed, but not like this.  Atwood said she wrote that all these things have happened to women.  I really need to get to reading the articles that explain that- I know I started one but it was bit too wordy at the time.  I guess I just personally didn't get this book and it wasn't "scary" or "prophetic" or made me feel like I should be worried about loosing my human rights.  I even tried watching the Hulu series of this book to see if I needed to feel and see it differently to understand it.  It didn't change how I felt.  Try as I might I can't seem to put myself in another's shoes in this book.  I liked the speculation more than the product.

library book

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Mom's Reading Corner- brought to you by a tropical smoothie

Image
This week for the Popsugar Challenge I have finished Miss Spitfire: Reaching Helen Keller by Sarah Miller for the prompt "a book by or about a person with a disability".  I have wanted to read this book for awhile since I found it was an Oregon Battle of the Books books.  I have been a fan of The Miracle Worker and Helen Keller's life for a long time.  I love American Sign Language and was even privileged enough to work with a group of deaf children as a camp counselor for a week.  This was a great book from Annie Sullivan's perspective.  She does call Helen some names that would be greatly frowned upon today but knowing that this is from a different time and being sensitive to Annie's childhood I was not taken aback.  I enjoyed this book.  I was originally going to attempt two books this week but as soon as I started reading Emily of New Moon by L.M. Montgomery I knew I wanted to savor that book.  Montgomery has such a way with words an...
Read more

The Great American Read: Day 49 War and Peace

Image
The unfortunate problem with doing a daily project such as this is that if you miss a few days they start piling up pretty fast and some books will not even get as much of a post as others especially incredibly long books such as War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy.  This book is just about as long as The Count of Monte Cristo but seems a lot more intimidating almost solely because it is Russian.  My roommate in college read it and I should have given her more props for such an amazing accomplishment.  Any way this will be the second to last book I get to on The Great American Read List .  Here are a few things I watched to give me an idea about what I will be getting myself into in the far far future.  One of the lamest and biggest reasons I want to read War and Peace is because one of the translators is named Larissa.  It is too bad Larissa is such a popular Russian name and Russian literature is so daunting to me.  This is a library ...
Read more

The Great American Read: Day 14 The Da Vinci Code

Image
"Everyone loves a conspiracy."  Yes, I am part of that everyone.  I really do love conspiracies, secret societies, ghost stories, mysterious disappearances, and haunted houses...all that stuff.  I use to have a big series of Raintree books from the 1970s that dealt with all of those things.  I have searched in vain for a picture of these books and the closest I have come is this blog that only has the pictures of the creature books.  Still those books made a big impression on me.  I think about them whenever I want to think about leaving it all behind to go on a crazy adventure to discovery what is the secret of the Bermuda Triangle...and get famous....but honestly it is just a bunch of fun thoughts of a different life that I don't have.  No worries- I still just read about them and stay safe at home.  All that to say I have been reading The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown.  It is fun stuff.  It is a little cheesy writing wise but I am to...
Read more