This book is so thick fear, rage, spite and betrayal that's it's emotionally exhausting to read. The patriarchal cage these women are raised in is wrought in a fine filigree of taboos, violence, public shame and private unvoiced rage but it's as nothing compared to what the women are willing to do to each other when they're alone in their Grace Year.
The book starts with two quotes: one from 'The Handmaid's Tale' and one from 'Lord Of The Flies'. The second one should have given me a heads-up that Kim Liggett was going to show me that girls can be just as savage as little boys.
I'm only a quarter of the way through the book, at the very start of the Grace Year, and already it feels like an ordeal.
It's wonderfully written but I can't spend more than a couple of hours with these women before I have to take a break.
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