Booker Prize 2019

The Testaments by Margaret Atwood

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The Testaments

History does not repeat itself, but it rhymes

Thirty-five years ago I read The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood for the first time and it frightened the life out of me, as it did most of its female readers at the time. It portrayed a terrifying future where everything that women had fought for and achieved over centuries was taken away from them, almost overnight, with speed and brutality. I’d never read anything quite like it before.

It had a huge influence on my writing. I loved the incisive and yet lyrical quality of the prose. I liked the bravery of the ambiguous ending. I never felt the need to know exactly what happened to Offred; or to know all the answers to the many questions posed at the end of the novel. Ambiguity is unnerving. It keeps you on your toes. Like real life, sometimes you don’t get to know what happens.

I didn’t think I would, but I have thoroughly enjoyed the TV series and feel that it compliments, rather than detracts from the book it is based on. Every camera shot is a work of art. It’s like a series of Dutch genre paintings in an edgier alternative reality. Dystopia has never looked so stylish!

So it was with some trepidation that I heard that there would be a sequel to the Handmaid’s Tale after such a long time gap. I was in two minds whether to read it or not, like going back to a restaurant in which you’ve had an excellent meal, only to find that it’s been taken over by new owners and isn’t quite as good.

The Testaments follows three characters – Aunt Lydia, Daisy and Agnes – an established Aunt and well known to us from the Handmaid’s Tale, and two ‘trainee’ Aunts. The problem I had with it, right from the start, was that I found Daisy a very irritating character and this did spoil my enjoyment of the novel, since she occupies a third of it. I understand that she is supposed to be precocious having been raised in the decadent surroundings of Canada, but her dialogue grates and she descends into caricature in places. I found it almost impossible to work up any empathy towards her.

That aside, The Testaments does link very cleverly into the TV series and answers a lot of questions stemming from the original novel. But did they really need answering? I’m not sure they did. Its great strength, however, is that it provides a fascinating insight into the mind and motives of Aunt Lydia – a chilling study into the way that totalitarian societies lure ordinary folk onto a path of which they would never have felt capable.

Do I wish she hadn’t written it? No, I don’t. I really enjoyed it and feel it’s a worthy joint winner of the Booker Prize 2019. However, I do wish the judges had come to a proper decision and not copped out, leaving poor Bernardine Evaristo feeling like an ‘also ran’ at, what should have been, a defining moment of her career.

I still think that Atwood should have concentrated the whole novel on Aunt Lydia, such a great character, and left Daisy in Canada, which would also have served to sort out one of the less convincing plotlines in the novel. But there’s no getting away from it – Margaret Atwood is a class act and always has been.

 

 

The Mars Room

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The Mars Room

Nothing to do with the Red Planet

With only a few days until the 2019 Booker shortlist is announced, I think it’s fair to say that I’m running a bit behind with my reading, having just finished The Mars Room by Rachel Kushner, one of the shortlisted books from last year. I chose this one because of the title, but it’s nothing whatsoever to do with a room full of astrophysicists monitoring the Red Planet. No, the Mars Room in question, is a lap dancing club and previous workplace of 29 year old Romy Hall, about to start two consecutive life sentences at Stanville Women’s Correctional Facility, California for murdering one of her clients.

The novel opens with Romy and her fellow prisoners being transported to their destination. It’s a powerful scene that introduces us to a number of characters, people she will be spending a lot of time with. Whilst she tries to remain detached from the bizarre, often brutal, events going on around her, the reader can sense her fear. The strength of the writing is apparent from the start, the restraint, the raw uncompromising tone and the occasional rye touches of humour.

But overall it’s bleak, outlining the plight of those that are born into a world of poverty and neglect, lives lived on the margins of criminality. Romy Hall is a woman with no hope. No hope of getting out any time soon and no hope of seeing her son, Jackson. We feel for her plight and yet, she’s not a sympathetic character, nor is she intended to be. During the novel, we’re given glimpses of her past life as a stripper and mother, it’s a story of bad luck and bad choices, in equal measure.

The harsh reality of prison life is expertly portrayed – the constant hustling for bare essentials, the bickering, the boring monotony of routine tasks performed day after day. Frustration ignites into aggression, then violence, over sometimes trivial issues. It’s a place populated by survivors and those less equipped to survive, like the naïve prison educator Gordon Hauser manipulated by many of the inmates, not least Romy herself.

For many reasons it’s not an easy read. It could be argued that there are too many characters. The storyline is haphazard and meandering. The novel jumps between perspectives, between first and third person narratives. Sometimes Romy’s voice gets lost amongst all the detail. I found it difficult to keep track of it at times. The ending is abrupt.

It’s an uncompromising book, but the book that Kushner wanted to write. So if you’re looking for a conventional read with a progressive storyline then don’t read this one. I found it a challenge – but well worth the effort.