I read Mudbound, Hillary Jordan’s debut novel, when it first came out, after Jordan did an event at the bookstore where I worked. After the reading, when asked about what she was working on next, Jordan hinted that her next novel would be very different from Mudbound, and I was instantly intrigued. The long-awaited When She Woke is finally about to be published, and let me tell you, it was worth the wait. It will be out on October 4th; mark your calendars now!
About the Book:
When Hannah Payne wakes up, she is red. Not pink, like she’s been out in the sun too long. Red. She has plenty of time to consider her new condition, locked, as she is, in an isolated room, no company but her own thoughts, her every move monitored and broadcast to homes across America. Hannah has been chromed, her skin dyed to signify the crime for which she has been convicted: murder. The victim? Her own unborn child.
When Hannah is released from her confinement, it is into a hostile world, where the violent hue of her skin causes some people to shrink back and others to leer threateningly. Even her own family, try as they might, cannot relate to Hannah in the same way they used to. Even Hannah herself, whose Christian faith was once unshakeable, finds she does not know this changed woman. As Hannah begins to make her way through this new world, everything she thought she knew about herself will be turned upside down.
My Thoughts:
If you read Mudbound, you are most likely wondering if the author of When She Woke is one and the same. I assure you, she is. The stories may be different, but the writing, the creativity, and the genius that I believe mark Jordan’s novels is fully present in both. Jordan has simply turned her gaze forward to a not-so-distant future instead of back to the recent past.
The future America in which Hannah’s ordeal plays out is a chilling extension of our own present. Church and state have grown uncomfortably close, a former mega-church pastor now serving as secretary of faith to the president. Footage of detained Chromes in isolation is broadcast as a sort of reality TV. Chromes can be geographically tracked via the Internet by any interested party. And, as Hannah’s situation makes clear, abortion is punished as murder. I think Margaret Atwood herself would be proud.
In her acknowledgements, Jordan gives a nod to Nathaniel Hawthorne, author of The Scarlet Letter, as the inspiration and basis for When She Woke. It has been many years since I read Hawthorne’s classic, and I hated it then as I hated nearly every book I was forced to read in high school. But if The Scarlet Letter can inspire such a thought-provoking novel as When She Woke, I believe it may be worth revisiting. You need not be familiar with Hawthorne’s novel to appreciate Jordan’s, though.
The range of themes Jordan tackles is staggering: abortion, religion, the punishment and reform of criminals, women’s rights. One of her skills as a writer, though, is how deftly she weaves her hefty chosen themes into a story that exhibits them perfectly without isolating them from their fictional context. She is truly a gifted writer, and one whose future work I will always eagerly anticipate.
Those are my thoughts. Check out When She Woke by Hillary Jordan on Goodreads or LibraryThing, or read other bloggers’ reviews!
Cloud Atlas is really six stories, set like Russian nesting dolls, one inside the other. It begins and ends with Adam Ewing, who keeps a journal as he travels across the south Pacific many years before our own. The peak of the mountain, the central story and the only one that isn’t split in half, takes place far beyond our time, near the end of human civilization. In between are four other tales, each one linked in some way to what comes before. Reading Cloud Atlas is truly a unique experience.
When Dr. Marina Singh finds out her former lab mate at Vogel Pharmaceutical, Anders Eckman, has died of a fever in the jungle, she is shocked and saddened. Dr. Eckman had gone to Brazil in search of Marina’s old professor, Dr. Swenson. The latter has supposedly been developing a potentially lucrative drug for years but has cut herself off from all outside communication, preferring to continue her work unmolested in a hidden corner of the Amazon.
I’m listening to the audio version narrated by Kate Reading, who is doing a lovely job, except for the fact that she pitches Jo’s voice so low I can’t tell her from Laurie. I’ve just finished Part 1. (I didn’t even realize it had parts!) My feelings about Little Women so far are mostly positive. I’m enjoying the story. I love all the societies and games the sisters make up, like the Pickwick Club and the Busy Bee Society. It’s also set during one of my favorite periods of history, one I’ve always enjoyed learning and reading about. But all the not-so-subtle morals are driving me ever so slightly nuts, and I much prefer the chapters that don’t end with some sort of lesson. I’m still undecided as to whether the explanations of what each sister in turn does or says or feels in a particular situation is a nice way to develop characters or a bit unnecessary. I think these few mild criticisms may have much to do with the fact that I am an older reader than those for whom the book was written.
Raised in France, Rebecca has moved to Athens to work on her art. Here she meets George, an expert in ancient languages and a translator, and Henry, an archaeologist in Athens on a dig. Both men are foreigners to Greece as Rebecca is: George is American, while Henry hails from England. The summer their lives converge is one that will leave them all deeply changed, in ways none could ever guess.