The Book of Joan, Lidia Yuknavitch, HarperCollins Publishers, 2017, 267 pp
This novel is the most post, post-apocalyptic one ever. Leave it to Lidia Yuknavitch and her fierce imagination. It is chilling, dense with story, in fact so dense it seems longer than 267 pages. Yet, I read it in two days.
Earth is as destroyed as it can be while still supporting a bit of human life. Climate change and nuclear war have left it radioactive. People must live in caves where they subsist on things that grow in the dark. Violence is still constant.
A beyond evil version of Elon Musk and the remaining wealthy people of the world live on a sort of space station platform, hovering over the planet and uploading any remaining resources via some advanced transporting technology. This leader, Jean de Men, subjects his followers to an uber police state, cult like existence but though most of the inhabitants are decadent and fooled by his "entertainments" there are two rebels.
On Earth, Joan, child-warrior, heroine, possessed of powers that echo the Orogenes in N K Jemison's Broken Earth trilogy, has been "martyred" by Jean de Men. (Actually the Broken Earth trilogy is even more post post-apocalyptic than The Book of Joan, now that I consider it.) Anyway, Joan lives to fight and die another day.
The imagery and personalities in this tale of horror are beyond disturbing. Perhaps only Lidia Yuknavitch could have created such things. The action is non-stop and almost addictive. It is not all gloom and doom however. Out of ultimate destruction comes hope and even possible enlightenment for humanity. If a reader can stomach the horror, The Book of Joan is an amazing read.
I have been drawn to these sorts of books lately. I blame N K Jemison as well as our current President and his lackeys. I hereby create a new genre sobriquet: Not For The Faint Of Heart.
(The Book of Joan is available in hardcover and paperback by order from Once Upon A Time Bookstore.)
Nice review as usual... I'll be adding this book to my ever growing reading wishlist!
ReplyDeleteThank you. Ever growing, yes. This one was on my list for over a year and now it is read!
DeleteIndeed it sounds not for the faint of heart. I try to steer away from post apocalyptic literature; I don't share that chaotic vision of mankind. I'm glad that you enjoyed though.
ReplyDeleteI am not sure I share that vision either but I can't help reading about it.
DeleteExciting news!! I just discovered that Lidia Yuknavitch is going to be at the 2018 Bay Area Book Festival at the end of next month in Berkeley, California along with a plethora of other great authors.
ReplyDeleteI am looking at the 2018 Bay Area Book Festival now, trying to decide which author events I am going to attend!!
Lucky you! I want to hear all about it. I have not seen her speak in person, though I have watched many videos.
DeleteLidia Yuknavitch is speaking twice at the Bay Area Book Festival this year!
DeleteHer first talk will feature solely and is titled:
"Lidia Yuknavitch in Person: On Fearlessness, Truth, and Misfits: There is no other literary voice like Lidia Yuknavitch’s. She is a “bold and ecstatic writer” (NPR), a writer’s writer, “a trailblazing literary voice that spans genres and dives deep” (Lenny Letter). The author of the award-winning speculative feminist novel “The Book of Joan” and the hypnotic memoir “The Chronology of Water” has experienced domestic violence, struggles with substance abuse, bouts of homelessness, and the loss of a child. In a raw, fearless voice she interrogates conformity, love, sex, the body, memory, and writing itself and inspires her readers with the courage to live (and write) fully. A protege of Ken Kesey and inspired by Kathy Acker, she is a self-proclaimed “misfit” and has penned a book, enhanced by interviews, called “The Misfit’s Manifesto.” Come hear her calls for authenticity in life and literature."
The second time Lidia Yuknavitch will be speaking with a panel of other women writers and the talk is titled:
"Women & Speculative Fiction: In the Footsteps of Atwood, Butler, and Le Guin: Margaret Atwood, Octavia Butler, and Ursula Le Guin are three titans of speculative fiction, having paved the way for a new generation of women who hold in their hands the future of the genre. Among this new generation are Asa Avdic, whose “The Dying Game” was called “an Orwellian debut novel that never lets up”; breakout novelist Maggie Shen King, author of “An Excess Male” (dubbed “‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ of a new generation”); literary powerhouse and award-winning author of “The Book of Joan” Lidia Yuknavitch; and influential feminist writer Meg Elison, who won the Philip K. Dick Award for “The Book of the Unnamed Midwife.”"
Thank you! I have read everything by Atwood. I have many to read yet by Le Guin and have not even started reading Octavia Butler. And now you give us more, new voices!
DeleteMargaret Atwood is wonderful!! And I look forward to reading both Le Guin & Butler too. In fact, I have a an Octavia Butler series awaiting to be read on my Kindle! The other authors mentioned above also sound incredible too.
ReplyDeleteI may not make it to both sessions with Lidia Yuknavitch as there are so many overlapping events/talks going on and they all sound fabulous.
Have you read this author before? I'm a bit scared to read it but I'm drawn to the action-packed part. I had to look the author up on Wiki and she's had quite a life / different. Reminds me a little of the movie District 9, though it differs.
ReplyDeleteI have read her memoir, The Chronology of Water. It is the best memoir I have ever read. I also read On the Small Backs of Children and never warmed to it. You are right to be scared. She is a very strange writer. But I liked The Book of Joan almost as much as Chronology. I looked up District 9 and it sounds good.
DeleteWasn't this a great read? In spite of the dark subject matter, I found it rather hopeful in the end. It gives one some optimism for the future of humanity, in spite of all the damage we have done to ourselves and our planet.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree!
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