Ragazze elettriche (utgåvan 2017)

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. The brutal illustration of the idea that power corrupts, the slow toppling of gender norms into a perfect reversal, and the gradual realization of the timeline of the book were all highlights for me. Parts of the book were hard to read for their violence, but at the same time I felt that none of the violence was gratuitous. It was horrifying because it was horrible. ( )

I read this as a book club selection and was pleasantly surprised how much I enjoyed it. It's a work of speculative fiction, "What if women had the natural strength and power instead of men? What would life/society be like?" The plot moves along with several compelling if not somewhat shallow, archetypal characters and eventually weaves their stories together. It's a very thought-provoking book and perfect for a book club discussion.

I had a few issues though.
a.) the extremely western portrayal of middle eastern/muslim women's lives nd genre roles. I didn't disagree with it but it could have been dealt with in a more nuanced and sublet way.
b.) the romance. It seems the author is saying that love can't happen unless everyone is on equal footing in terms of power. I think I agree but I would have like to see this thread pulled and explored more.

Overall, a quick enjoyable read. ( )

When I heard that Naomi Alderman’s mentor is the queen of speculative fiction Margaret Atwood, I knew The Power was a book I had to read. The Power is written as a book within a book. It starts with a letter from an author named Neil Adam Armon (an anagram of Naomi Alderman) to another author named Naomi. Neil has written a historical fiction novel set 5000 years ago (which would make it set in the present day) about what happened when teenage girls suddenly developed the power to shoot powerful volts of electricity out of their hands. The balance of power in the world shifts when women are suddenly able to overpower men whenever they want.

It turns out that power corrupts women just as much as it corrupts men and a female-dominated society isn’t the benevolent matriarchy one might imagine. It’s an interesting thought experiment that Alderman engages in. She does so with nuance and a touch of dark humor. Once I finished, I immediately wanted to read it again because I know I’ll get even more out of it when I know where the story is headed. We read this book for one of my book clubs and there was a lot to talk about – it makes for a great discussion. My book club is all-female – I’d be really interested in what male readers think of it. I’m guessing most would find it pretty eye-opening. Highly recommended. ( )

This is a tricksy book.
The story isn't hugely engaging and some of the characters are occasionally a bit thin and incomprehensible. BUT, as a thought provoking work it's up there with the best. Presents some interesting views on gender roles in a really engaging and accessible way.
I really enjoyed having my thoughts challenged and stretched. ( )

When I first read about The Power I was both intrigued and a little put-off by the premise; women suddenly develop the ability to generate electric bolts and use them as a weapon, similar to how electric eels operate. This obviously has serious repercussions in society as women are now physically dominant to men. I was intrigued because, well, doesn’t it just sound fascinating? But at the same time it sounded a little too much of a concept book and I was worried that it would be all message and no story, and more importantly no character.

Luckily it has all three, a message, a story, and characters. It is a fascinating book.

There are four main narrators, three women and one man. There is also a series of letters framing the story, between a man and a woman in some long distant future. This story is part of their ancient history.

If all that sounds confusing, well, don’t worry, it isn’t. It’s just a nice little device used to highlight some of the issues the book raises. Power, corruption, gender identity, politics, sexism, etc.

The main theme of the book is right there in the title, power, who has it and what they do with it. It uses the inequalities between the sexes today to explore those power dynamics, and in part it is about sexism and misogyny, but I think that the central argument of the novel is that power, in and of itself, creates problems.

It isn’t a perfect book however, I think that individual’s attitudes towards themselves and the “opposite” sex changed a little too quickly. Society has conditioned us all in a million different ways, I’m not so sure that we’d change so utterly in our private thoughts and attitudes within one lifetime, especially for those who were older when the change occurred.

There is some mention of men who develop this power, and women who never do, but these are more in passing rather than an overt look at transgender or intersex people. And race doesn’t seem to be looked at at all. But one novel can’t do everything, so I wouldn’t criticise it too much for that.

However there is a point midway through the novel when I felt it was a little stuck and slow, but the pace soon picked up again and I didn’t have any other issues with it.

Overall I really enjoyed it, it was a quick easy read, although some scenes were quite disturbing. And it really was an interesting look at society and people, and of course, power interact. ( )