(An Audio version of this will appear on the August Book Review Podcast – Reading in Bed which can be found on all of the usual networks including readinginbed.bandcamp.com - out now)
Blurb:
Life is hard enough for a teenage girl in 1950s suburbia without having a mother who may—or may not—be a witch. A single mother at that. Sure, she fits in with her starched dresses, string of pearls, and floral aprons. Then there are the hushed and mystical consultations with neighborhood women in distress. The unsavory, mysterious plants in the flower beds. The divined warning to steer clear of a boyfriend whose fate is certainly doomed. But as the daughter of this bewitching homemaker comes of age and her mother’s claims become more and more outlandish, she begins to question everything she once took for granted.
Strengths / Weaknesses:
Lot time listeners of ‘Reading in Bed’ My Book Review Podcast with my wife, Amanda Nicholson will know at one point growing up I was a massive fan of Margaret Atwood’s work – reading her now classic ‘The Handmaid’s tale’ in 1988 I seem to recall just before I left school and was left spellbound by it’s power surprising more than a few teachers and to a frequent level of mocking by some of the kids at school (I was never mister popular at school) who I suspect learnt how far I was ahead of most of them reading years ago, then Cat’s Eye which is still my favourite book of hers, The Robber Bride, Alias Grace (which is a really interesting case to read up she made a fictional version from) and The Blind Assaisn – all not long after they came out.
A lot of Ms Atwood’s later work I haven’t read after simply moving to other writer’s work (and I haven’t seen The Handmaid’s tale TV series before you ask) but this simply came on Prime Reading on Amazon and noting it was a 32 page short story, I thought oh let’s go for it, I’ll be able to read that during one journey to and from work which was for sure.
What did I think off it? Well, it’s not a patch on any of the novels I’ve mentioned above but it’s okay but not a classic. Perhaps if Ms Artwood had expanded it, she could have gone further into the relationship between the two main characters, but for what the story is a short and certainly not sweet study of a daughter’s utter (and very normal) contempt for her mother.
The story itself was a strange one, curious, certainly engaging and mysteries. Did I buy the narrative? Speaking from a male point of view, I am not sure I did in particular the references to witchcraft. I also found the references to the main character’s father when she met him for the first time since she was a child curious also considering she hadn’t seen him since she was a child a little off.
I was a little surprised she met him, let alone described him in such a reasonable tone and then promptly killed the character not that much later and had both her and her mother both at the funeral when her mother hadn’t spoke to him in years, let alone no reference to his other children.
The ending however in this story was great after her mother died, and the main character’s relationship with her own daughter coming full circle onto the next generation wondering whether the barriers will ever be fixed or like with most parent’s relationships, is the damage done by the previous generation and the one before that.
I am undecided which is what I am with this story to be honest, as I think it should have being more to be honest, but I felt by the end of the story I didn’t really know the two main characters and the father and to get to grips with what they wanted and needed simply to be teased out.
I was quite disappointed with it, but that could well be just be me.
6/10
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