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Summary: When societal oversight of genetics R&D is bypassed
Review: It's not far-fetched or even very futuristic: genetics research is being privately funded by the mass sales of irresistibly appealing pharmaceuticals and therapeutic biotechnology--aphrodesiacs, youth-restoratives, designer offspring. Runaway competition among the top players in the genetic technology field had led to the construction of huge gated, guarded, and self-contained communities for the families of each lab's staff and administation. The lab research runs on, devoid of oversight and regulation by any wider society. The "wider society" is what lies outside the gates of these research communities. They are the so-called "pleeblands"--where the underprivileged plebes live, with their dreams of immortality and their governments that have become totally irrelevant to the forces of technology that define the future of life on the planet. And that future includes a vast array of new varieties and species of plants, animals, and microbes, most engineered with profit in mind. Think about chickens with breastmeat tumors and numerous wing and drumstick appendages for marketing to the fast-food chicken industries. Think about superviruses engineered to produce total homeland insecurity, should the need for it arise. What looms large in award-winning author Margaret Atwood's new novel, Oryx and Crake, is the power of top scientists to impose their own values and standards--and biases and whims--upon the future of planetary life. Her protagonists are realistically drawn with typical "baggage" left from childhood experience, the hidden motives that affect all human choices. She shows us a future that is already so present that it doesn't strike us as particularly nightmarish. It's believable and entirely possible, if the governments of the world neglect to legislate regulatory protocols that pertain to all research, both publicly and privately funded. Everyone currently engaged in genethics discussions and other genetics-and-religion conversations is already aware of such a possible future. This scenario is the reason to remain vigilant and proactively sceptical of the claims of "forge-ahead science" for limitless progress and therapeutic benefit for humanity.
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Summary: My New Favorite Atwood!
Review: I've been a huge Atwood fan since I was in high school and have read all her novels and short stories, but I think "Oryx and Crake" has moved into the top spot as my favorite Margaret Atwood novel; it's simply riveting. I started the novel tight after seeing British director, Danny Boyle's new movie "28 Days Later" and it couldn't have been better timing. Both stories contain a fast acting virus that decimates the planet and both stories keep you "on the edge of your seat". Atwood's dystopia is all the more harrowing because it's based on bio-technology that is ALREADY in play, perhaps already being misused. Her phrase to describe some of the horror: "unintended consequences" is darkly humorous. I don't often read science fiction (and this isn't) or speculative fiction (this is) because I often find the genres tough reading; too much techno-babble, too "out there". Not so "Oryx and Crake" which is immensely readable, fast paced and eerily enough, often humorous! All hail Margaret!
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Summary: Uninteresting first chapter.
Review: With the best intentions (and a lot of concentration), I managed to get through the first chapter of Oryx and Crake. But then I closed the book forever. Maybe I just don't like science fiction, but I didn't find the book interesting at all. It's unfair for me, perhaps, not to begin chapter two, but I have a rule never to read a second chapter if the first one bores me. And Oryx and Crake did.
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Summary: An Unfortunately too Possible Plot
Review: I read relatively little fiction. An occasional science fiction or fantasy book, or more rarely historical fiction or mysteries are about as far as I go. This looked like an interesting plot involving some biology and so I decided to read it. It was well worth the effort! Despite the depressing insight on arrogant and stupid human motivations, Margaret Atwood has produced a cautionary tale of the not too distant future where genetic engineering has reached its ultimate technical level. This is an age where our common pets are replaced with genetically altered or spliced rakunks and organs are farmed in pigoons (which later turn out to have picked up some human intelligence in the process!). It is not difficult for a warped genius like Crake to utilize his skill and the desires of his fellow humans to spread a deadly virus that destroys nearly all of humanity. His "friend" Jimmy- now called Snowman- who is immunized against the plague Crake has unleashed, and the "Crakers"- genetically altered humans who live at a basic level of their own- seem to be all that is left. Crake and his "girlfriend" Oryx who we see originally as the subject of a kiddie porn site when she is eight years old, die apparently as a result of Crake's jealousy of the secret sexual relationship between Oryx and Jimmy. The final ending (which I will not reveal) is a bit surprising, but believable and after 9/11, the anthrax attacks and our current state of semi-war, it is unfortunately not too difficult to imagine this tale of technology gone wrong as a possible, but preventable, future. I recommend this book as a chilling reminder of man's inhumanity to man and where it might lead.
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Summary: Brave New World
Review: Great read. Think Margaret Atwood channeling Kurt Vonnegut. Or think Aldous Huxley. Brilliant. A page-turning-thought-provoking-too-close-to-home-post-humans-run-amuck-love story. Funny, edgy, and very smart.
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Summary: very disappointing
Review: I was excited about the comparison between Atwood's lastest book Oryx and Crake, with The Handsmaids Tale, one of my all time favorite books.
It took much discipline to actually make it through the book. The story failed to develop the emotional excitement that carried the Handmaid's Tale so suspensefully through to the end. The book was conceived as a whole to Atwood, and I feel like it needed to time to flesh out into a more mature story before it was released. The concept was worthy of more.
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Summary: Wow - she does it again!
Review: Just finished reading this...amazing! It is somewhat of a departure from Atwood's more recent books, and much more like Handmaid's Tale. Atwood has brilliantly created a plausible yet (science) fictional world - I'm going to reread Handmaid's Tale ASAP.
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Summary: Why Compare to Handmaid's Tale???
Review: I voraciously read this book in two days and could not put it down. Its creepy, bleak futuristic view of what life could be like held my attention. You can't help but compare where we are in real life - age of technology, reality tv shows, genetic/bio engineering - with the picture Atwood portrays in her novel. Maybe that's why it was so hard to put down. I don't understand the need to compare to any of her previous novels. Oryx and Crake stands alone. Fine work!
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Summary: Not Handmaid's Tale--But That's Not a Bad Thing
Review: If you love Margaret Atwood and her writing, each time she finishes a book, you wonder how she will ever top it. The Handmaid's Tale, which Oryx and Crake is most frequently compared to, is one of her finest work. I am an ardent Atwood scholar and have read all her works. Having seen mixed reviews in the media about Oryx and Crake, I was somewhat afraid to start reading it, particularly because it is somewhat in the same genre as The Handmaid's Tale (a brilliant book and one of my favorite books of all time.) An author's streak of genius can't last forever, and I was waiting for the sun to set on Margaret Atwood. I was lucky enough to be proved wrong. This novel is set on an intruiging premise, and although it took a little longer to get engrossed in Oryx and Crake than in some of Atwood's other work, it moves along at a nice and quite horrifying trot, pulling you in with the almost-recognizable familiarity of bio-engineered events. You like Snowman/Jimmy, it's just that....well, who exactly is the bad guy here? And maybe that's the point. In today's world, with PR spin and ducking politicians, there is no great antagonist we're struggling against--which would make life much clearer. This novel isn't as bad as the worst reviews promise, it's not as good as the best claim, but it's still a very good book. I noticed that Atwood's writing seemed a little less compelling, acute and participatory than in previous novels. Perhaps the writing reflects the detachment and bemusement of Snowman himself. Although what happens is shocking, it is relayed in a very methodical, non-emotional way. The best thing about the book was the last few chapters--they surprised me, causing me to think for a lengthy period of time after I'd closed the book. In fact, that night I had very troubled dreams about the subject matter of destruction and a single person's capability for such in today's advanced world. It's been a long time since a book's premise made it into my dreams, so although it may not have gripped me with iron claws in the beginning, I suppose Oryx and Crake got me in the end.
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Summary: Unintended Consequences
Review: This is a highly creative and fascinating novel from Atwood, and quite a departure from her previous works. In this great exercise of speculative fiction, biotech has run amuck and the worst unintended consequences have come to fruition. One man's megalomaniac drive to improve the human condition through biotech alteration has led to the downfall of civilization, with rampaging viruses and feral designer animals destroying a dysfunctional corporate-controlled society. Atwood is clearly using this far-fetched but still ominous storyline to comment on the biotech industry and the desires of a few profiteers to control the biological destinies of millions of people, plus the coming domination of human rights by corporate profiteering in general. Sometimes this commentary is a bit heavy-handed, but the story remains fascinating and chilling. Atwood's writing style is poetic and spooky, while her main characters are fully developed but remain intriguingly mysterious. This will prove to be one of the most haunting, stirring, and innovative new novels of the year.
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