Prisons, capitalism, and a whole lot of nonsense
The Heart Goes Last by Margaret Atwood
The Heart Goes Last by Margaret Atwood
Published: September 29, 2015 by Nan A. Talese
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Synopsis:
Stan and Charmaine are a married couple trying to stay afloat in the midst of an economic and social collapse. Job loss has forced them to live in their car, leaving them vulnerable to roving gangs. They desperately need to turn their situation around - and fast. The Positron Project in the town of Consilience seems to be the answer to their prayers. No one is unemployed and everyone gets a comfortable, clean house to live in... for six months out of the year. On alternating months, residents of Consilience must leave their homes and function as inmates in the Positron prison system. Once their month of service in the prison is completed, they can return to their "civilian" homes. At first, this doesn't seem like too much of a sacrifice to make in order to have a roof over one's head and food to eat. But when Charmaine becomes romantically involved with the man who lives in their house during the months when she and Stan are in the prison, a series of troubling events unfolds, putting Stan's life in danger. With each passing day, Positron looks less like a prayer answered and more like a chilling prophecy fulfilled.
Rating:
Review:
This book may have only been 320 pages and about a 12 hour audiobook but it felt like it took forever. And by the end of it, I have no idea what this book wanted to tell me. Was it a foray into the idea that true love doesn’t exist? A discussion about human relationships and sex in a technological world? Using labor as profit? Corporate prison systems? The dangers of allowing corporations power over the lives of individuals? Or maybe a commentary about the eternal quest for money and comfort? It seemed to want to be all of these things but because it was so meandering and jam packed with characters it ended up being none of those things.
I have no idea what level of catastrophe happened in the United States to cause the populace to voluntarily enter the prison system for life. The book vaguely alludes to some kind of financial collapse but it is never explored or explained in any detail. I also don’t understand how one part of the world is living in ruin hiding from roving gangs and trying to survive. But there are other parts of the world that are buying sex robots and spending all their money on plastic surgery to never age. Maybe this was an attempt at commentary on social classes and the dichotomy of rich and poor, but it was poorly done and I never believed that those two worlds co-existed simultaneously.
Charmaine and Stan start out as an average married couple. They depend on each other. Both are a bit naive and stupid but they love each other. Stan isn’t a fan of the Positron idea, but he will agree to it because Charmaine wants the security of it. Somehow they both decide to become completely opposite people once they enter Positron and become extremely unlikeable. By the end I hated them both. Stan’s actions at the end of the book are so disgusting that it tainted the entire book.
In the end it told me nothing, it made me ponder nothing and it was a waste of my time. I gave it 2 stars for having an interesting idea and some of the ideas were interesting but the rest was garbage.