3. Margaret Atwood:

 

The Robber Bride

written: 1993

(468 pages)

 

read in May 2013

verdict: DISLIKE

 

Set in late twentieth-century Canada, the story is focussing on three women, Tony, Roz and Charys, who each have a good reason to hate their erstwhile friend, Zenia, because she stole or estranged their husbands from them at some point in their lives. At the beginning of the book, they meet at Zenia's supposed funeral. Through the next chapters, we get to know their respective histories with Zenia.

 

This was the first of our surprise books we actually read in the original, and unfortunately, it was also the first book we did not finish. We dragged ourselves through 22 of the 57 chapters (about 150 pages) and then we simply thought, life's too short, and gave up. So why didn't we like it?

 

The story sounded intriguing enough, we were hoping to find a good twist in the plot, there was even a film made from the book. But the way the main female characters were described wasn't at all to our liking. They can only be described as major bitches with personality issues and no self-esteem whatsoever. If the author was trying to make the reader sympathize with them, she failed dismally with us. If anything, we started to understand Zenia, why she had this devilish pleasure of hurting the women. Somehow they were begging for abuse, and the way they let these incidents traumatize them and rule their lives after so many years simply wasn't likeable at all. We wanted to say: "Get a grip, girls, don't cling to bad things." Then we took our own advice, and put the book aside. We were curious how the book would end though, so we browsed through the last pages, but the ending seemed not really worth the bother either.

 

Enough said about the book. The Canadian author, Margaret Atwood (1939) has a good reputation, but this book simply wasn't our cup of tea.

 

In short: highly unlikeable characters, unengaging story. Sadly, a DISLIKE.