The Power

A spectacular book! Extremely refined storytelling, with layers and nuance that allow the reader to consider perspectives they may not have considered before.

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The premise is that a power awakens in young women around the world that makes them able to generate and discharge electricity. Obviously, if women understood that men could no longer hurt them, the balance of power would shift on all levels from the interpersonal to the geo-political. Would we usher in an Era of Terror in retaliation for the 6500 years of violent oppression by the patriarchy? Naomi Alderman seems to think so.

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It began in the places under the motorway bridges, where the poor people live in blanket tents or houses constructed from cardboard and tape. This is the place men come when they want a woman they can use without law or licence, discard without censure. The power has been passed from palm to palm here for three years now. And the many death-bearing hands of women have a name here: Kali, the eternal. Kali, who destroys to bring fresh growth. Kali, intoxicated by the blood of the slain. Kali, who puts out the stars with her thumb and forefinger. Terror is her name and death is her breathing in and out. Her arrival in this world has been long expected. Any adjustment in understanding had come easily to the women under the motorway bridges of the megacity.        

Beyond the phenomenal premise, the story is told from several perspectives at once; from the level of the characters, the level of the internal book, and the level of the future - the outer-most context container. It’s very clever novel-writing.

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Allie has a sudden intuition then. Like a fairground machine with gears working and chains clanking. Someone had taken her to one when she was a little girl. Put in two quarters, pull the lever, clunk, grind, thunk; there’s a fortune, printed on a small rectangle of thick, pink-edged cardboard. Allie’s intuition is just like that: sudden and complete, as if there were machinery working behind her eyes that even she has no access to. Clank, thunk.

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The voice says: Here. This is something you know now. Use it.        

For those that are interested in the story but don’t want to read can find the series made from this book on Prime. Here in Italy, the series is called “Ragazze elettriche" ('Electric girls'). I watched the first episode of it just to see how the characters were cast and if they told the story from the outer most context-container. (The casting is excellent, and, no, they didn’t begin the story from the outer-most container, but maybe they'll save that for the end.)

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This story is graphically violent, but for any woman who has ever been accosted by a man (which is to say, most women) the violence is not excessive.

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This read was a recommendation from fellow reader, John Lane. Thanks, John! This book is excellent and a thrilling ride. I would give it more stars, if I could.