Cosmic Corner

Ponder A Moment...

Book Review
This Week's Book is...

Woman on the Edge of Time by Marge Piercy

I only read this book because I twice saw it favourably compared with Ursula Le Guin's The Dispossessed, but I enjoyed it so much that I now intend to read all of Marge Piercy's other novels. Woman on the Edge of Time is both a searing indictment of some of the fundamental assumptions of our society and an intriguing portrayal of a "utopian" alternative.
Connie, the heroine, is a 37 year old Mexican-American living on welfare. The story involves her incarceration in a mental hospital and subjection to "mind-control" treatment. The realism of the narrative makes this really chilling (reminiscent of One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest) and, combined with the knowledge we gradually acquire of her life story, it paints a bleak but far too plausible picture of how our society has institutionalised oppression of the weak. The story culminates with Connie's resolution to fight back, with a recognition that she is fighting a war on behalf of others as well as herself.
Woman on the Edge of Time is much more inventive in its speculations as to the potential uses of modern technology. (Biotechnology is most prominent, but Piercy's ideas about the possible roles of computers are quite prophetic considering Woman was written in 1976.)
With so many provoking ideas and a compelling narrative, Woman on the Edge of Time is a great novel, certainly the best work of science fiction I have read in years.

(Review by Danny Yee, See Web Site below)