Rating: 
Summary: Happiness and cheer abound
Review: Sure it does. It is very much not a good idea for a reader to attempt to psychoanalyze an author through their own works, because not only will you probably come to the wrong conclusions, but the ones you do come up with will probably creep you out just a little bit. To whit: Margaret Atwood probably is a delightfully cheery woman who quite enjoys life and all she encounters . . . however that sure doesn't come across in her novels. In her best novels the misery her characters suffer often eventually dovetails into a gloriously insightful epiphany of sorts. And in other cases you often feel like just guilty reading the book, after a while you get the impression by continuing to read you're furthering the character's Job-like troubles. Life Before Man was a bit of a downer but at least it was spread over four people . . . here poor Rennie has to take it all on the chin herself. Young woman journalist Rennie is sent to a Caribbean island to write a vacation type story . . . what happens is quite simply the vacation from hell. There's really no other way to put it. Nobody is what they seem, Rennie is totally out of place and things start getting very serious before anyone knows what's going on. However if that's all there was to the book then it would simply be a matter of plodding on to see what Ms Atwood is going to do next to poor Rennie. To save the story, Atwood details Rennie's crumbling relationship with her boyfriend, as well as her relationships with both her family and others . . . these quasi-flashbacks (some are given as monologues, though I'm not sure who she's talking to) are interspersed throughout the novel and are where the story truly shines. When she wants to Atwood can get right to the heart of a person and choose the exact right words to get the emotions right. The ending alone is one of the best examples of a stark prose style I've ever seen. So ignore the quasi-political intrigue plot and instead focus on a masterful character study by one of the few authors who know how to get such things right. The feelings she reveals may be painful but you can't argue that she's all that far off.
Rating:
Summary: Happiness and cheer abound
Review: Sure it does. It is very much not a good idea for a reader to attempt to psychoanalyze an author through their own works, because not only will you probably come to the wrong conclusions, but the ones you do come up with will probably creep you out just a little bit. To whit: Margaret Atwood probably is a delightfully cheery woman who quite enjoys life and all she encounters . . . however that sure doesn't come across in her novels. In her best novels the misery her characters suffer often eventually dovetails into a gloriously insightful epiphany of sorts. And in other cases you often feel like just guilty reading the book, after a while you get the impression by continuing to read you're furthering the character's Job-like troubles. Life Before Man was a bit of a downer but at least it was spread over four people . . . here poor Rennie has to take it all on the chin herself. Young woman journalist Rennie is sent to a Caribbean island to write a vacation type story . . . what happens is quite simply the vacation from hell. There's really no other way to put it. Nobody is what they seem, Rennie is totally out of place and things start getting very serious before anyone knows what's going on. However if that's all there was to the book then it would simply be a matter of plodding on to see what Ms Atwood is going to do next to poor Rennie. To save the story, Atwood details Rennie's crumbling relationship with her boyfriend, as well as her relationships with both her family and others . . . these quasi-flashbacks (some are given as monologues, though I'm not sure who she's talking to) are interspersed throughout the novel and are where the story truly shines. When she wants to Atwood can get right to the heart of a person and choose the exact right words to get the emotions right. The ending alone is one of the best examples of a stark prose style I've ever seen. So ignore the quasi-political intrigue plot and instead focus on a masterful character study by one of the few authors who know how to get such things right. The feelings she reveals may be painful but you can't argue that she's all that far off.
Rating: 
Summary: Haunting Look at the Ways Our Bodies Can Be Harmed
Review: The aptly-named Bodily Harm by Margaret Atwood is a suspensfully-woven tale that keeps you turning pages. Focused on the harms that can befall a woman, it takes a philosophical look at both the physical and emotional dangers Rennie Wilford faces as she comes to terms with a major life change.After her mastectomy, journalist Rennie Wilford and her boyfriend break up and she begins a strange affair with her doctor, who makes her feel almost complete. However, when Rennie returns to her apartment one day to find a length of coiled rope on her bed and no sign of forced entry, she is convinced that it would be a good idea to take a long vacation and get out of town for a while. Under these circumstances, Rennie ends up on the island of St. Antoine in the Caribbean during a time of political upheaval. There she finds herself being drawn into a complex and dangerous world she doesn't understand. A recurring image of Rennie's grandmother, who has misplaced her hands, seems to serve as a grand metaphor for the story. It seems like throughout the process and aftermath of her mastectomy, Rennie won't let people get close to her or touch her. This leads to her breakup with her boyfriend. She has forgotten how to reach outside of herself. Wrapped up in her own misery, she is self-focused, and it is only as she is drawn into the events in St. Antoine that she really gets past her physical change and grows to understand what it means to be a truly complete woman. Atwood is always very good at making even banal surroundings seem sinister, and the events surrounding Rennie in St. Antoine are written to keep you on the edge of your seat. Trust no one, for they are not who they seem. But trust Atwood to give you a good excuse to sit home on a Friday night.
Rating: 
Summary: Discomforting and disturbing
Review: This is the second novel by Atwood that I've read, along with a few short stories, and I'm not sure I have the intestinal fortitude to read another. Her grim themes pop up again here like mushrooms after a spring rain. Like "The Handmaid's Tale", this novel is suffused with anger and darkness, although the locale this time is a sunny tropical island. Rennie, the main character, is a thoroughly unlikable woman: bitter, angry, cynical, a bit of a coward. Very human, in other words. The story flips back and forth between what is happening on the island and her life back in a sterile and constricted Canada. Through the painful events in the book, it seems that blame for all the violence and agony in the world is laid at the feet of men: men as users and abusers, corrupted by power, not to be trusted, but also loved and desired despite all that (and does that make us women "weak" and somehow partners in our own subjugation?) I found all the ambivalence very wearing. But life is full of ambivalence. Those looking for a light relaxing read that leaves no aftertaste would be advised to choose something else.
Rating:
Summary: Strange but Compelling
Review: Though I wouldn't consider this my favorite Atwood novel, it is a good one, nonetheless. Atwood has a way of involving you with her characters, even if you don't necessarily like them. I couldn't put this book down, because I was so intent on finding out the fate of the heroine. Part mystery and part romance but all introspective, I'd recommend it.
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