The Year of the Flood - Part 1

I chose The Year of the Flood for my summative novel, in part due to the fact that a dystopian novel seemed much better than the other choices, but also because it was written by Margaret Atwood, who also wrote The Handmaid’s Tale.

Having enjoyed the television adaptation, I went into the book with somewhat high expectations. Oh boy, was I wrong! This sums up how I felt having finished 27 chapters.

What is going on in this book? On the surface, it is a bizarre story about the two protagonists Toby and Ren and a weird cult who call themselves the Gardeners. However, I can’t seem to grasp what lies beneath the surface. I hope the next part of the novel is able to shed some light on that.

First of all, I really appreciate the sizes of the chapters in the book. The short chapters, sometimes as short as 3 pages, were really helpful in being able to read the book in shorter bursts.

The book is based in a dystopian setting, which seems to be at sometime within the near future. The book doesn’t mention a specific time, which adds to to suspense, and helps the readers realise such a future could actually be really close. The book follows two timelines in this dystopia, one after a mysterious waterless “flood”, and one before. The pre-flood world is essentially controlled by an organization called the CorpSeCorps. It is in this society in which our protagonists grow up. Toby studies holistic medicine, while her mother dies due to a mysterious illness. It is suggested later on that this illness is somehow related to the flood. Toby’s father spends all his money in attempting to treat his wife, which ends up in him taking his own life in the garage, while Toby is in the house. Now orphaned, Toby is forced to work in a restaurant chain called SecretBurgers. Here, she is sexually abused by her boss Blanco, until she is rescued by the Gardeners. Pretty brutal past if you ask me. The Gardeners cult is what ties Toby with Ren, who is also a member of this eco-religious sect, brought into it by her parents. Back to the post-flood world, Toby is stuck in a spa, while Ren is stuck in a club called The Scales where she once worked as a trapeze artist/prostitute. We are introduced to a myriad of other characters, including Zeb, Lucerne, Bernice, Pilar, Adam One and numerous Eves.

The Gardeners are a vegan sect, whose teachings combine environmentalism with Christian theology. They are self sufficient and grow foods on rooftop gardens, secluded from the rest of society. Through the Gardeners and their lessons, Margaret Atwood seems to be preaching environmental issues and the ethics of eating meat. This was interesting to me, and I could resonate with the book since I am a vegetarian and plan to study environmental engineering. Through the element of food, the book’s message on the modern American diet is apparent. Through the means of the contrast between SecretBurgers and the diet of the Gardeners, Atwood promotes a healthy diet and knowledge of what one is eating.

The feminist and Marxist tones in the book are glaringly obvious. The gender differences in this society is clear, with the males being the dominant gender. This is demonstrated through the portrayal of many female characters as sex objects. This can also be seen through the presence of men in all positions of authority, including Adam One, Blanco and Mordis. The book is also solely through the perspective of females.

The book also depicts the class struggles in this dystopian setting. Not dissimilar to everything else, the different classes are named bizarrely as well. The classes of Eurotrash, Tex-Mexicans, Redfish and Asian Fusion constantly clash among themselves. However, the CorpSeCorps and the residents of the HealthWyzer Compound are at the top of the pecking order,

Overall, the first section of this novel has certainly piqued my interest, but I found it disappointing overall. The book raises too many questions without resolving any of them. We, as readers still have no idea what the flood is, what caused it, why the protagonists survive and the significance of the Gardeners. The book really needs to step up to clean up the mess left behind by the first 27 chapters.