HCAU Reviews: The Power
https://www.amazon.com.au/Power-WINNER-BAILEYS-WOMENS-FICTION-ebook/dp/B01EW5JKMM
You’ve probably heard something about The Power by now, given that the book is everywhere at the moment. Once you’ve read it, you will see why. This is Naomi Alderman’s fourth novel, and was shortlisted for the Bailey’s Women’s Prize for Fiction 2017. Everyone I have spoken to about this book has loved it, so why not pick up a copy and give it a go?
The book concentrates on four central characters from various places around the world, tracking their journeys through a new version of the world: What if it was the men who were afraid to go out alone at night? Or men who knew they could be easily overpowered? The book asks many questions such as these throughout, forcing readers to contemplate contemporary society, as well as how we would react to dramatic changes on a global scale.
The novel begins in a recognisable world, everything the same as it is today, apart from one thing. Young teenage girls of around 14 and 15 years old have changed. They have electrical power within them, enabling them to send out jolts of varying degrees. But this is just the beginning. The novel examines the way in which societies around the world would react to such a game-changing development as this, escalating throughout, with a new world order seeming to emerge.
Whatever you take from the book, it will leave you thinking. This book can’t help but ask questions, examining a wide range of different issues. It leaves you contemplating a variety of difficult to ask, and even more difficult to answer, questions. Basically, this is not a book you want to miss.