Book Review: The Year of the Flood

Another book bites the dust. After nearly a year of thinking about reading The Year of the Flood, I finally finished it! It's the second in a trilogy about the post-apocalyptic world created by Margaret Atwood. The first was Oryx and Crake. Atwood hasn't written the third book yet.

If you remember, I thoroughly enjoyed Oryx and Crake. The first book set the scene for the apocalypse. It told the story of how Crake (Glenn) had created a plague that he distributed via sex pills. By the end of that book, Atwood made it clear that at least a few humans had survived.

In The Year of the Flood, Atwood writes about other humans who have survived the "Waterless Flood." She follows two women who had once belonged to a sort of enviro cult called the God's Gardeners: Toby and Ren. By the end of this book, we see that a handful of people have survived the waterless flood, including many of the God's Gardeners.

Atwood has the ability to weave stories together seamlessly. Even though it is improbable that things in this book could ever happen, Atwood makes it believable. Her writing is also amazing. She is able to tell a story from many points of view. Toby's chapters are written in the third person while Ren's chapters are written in the first person. By doing this, Atwood helps create believable characters.

I still have one more gift card left over from my birthday. I'm going to pick up The Russian Debutante's Handbook this morning.