Review by Bridget Quinn-Carey
I read Margaret Atwood's new book, Year of the Flood, as the 2009 H1N1 pandemic was developing. This real-life backdrop for reading a novel depicting a disease-plagued, genetically-engineered world shows Atwood's apocalyptic vision, or some version of it, may not be long in coming.
Atwood's near-future is controlled by a private corporation, CorpSEcorps -- subcontracted by the government; a sinister and omnipresent Blackwater-like company that rules society. The professional class is controlled and protected in gated subdivisions while the middle and lower classes, the "pleebs," are out fending for themselves in cities, with frequently violent encounters only marginally controlled by CorpSEcorps.
The countryside has generally been abandoned as genetic engineering has completely replaced agriculture and husbandry. Rogue engineered cross breeds, some with human-level thinking and reasoning capacity, keep most people from venturing outside urban environments. The Gardener's are cult-like earth loving vegans committed to saving themselves and being the surviving species after the Waterless Flood - the Gardener-prophesized plague.
Still, don't expect a classic good vs. evil story, the relationships between and among the characters and social classes are much more complex and entangled.
This is the sequel of sorts to Atwood's 2003 novel, Oryx and Crake, but you don't need to have read that work to appreciate Year of the Flood. While an apocalyptic tale, Year of the Flood is not all gloom and doom. One of Atwood's most impressive talents is her ability to simultaneously scare you, enthrall you, suspend your disbelief and reward you with gifts of subtle witty humor strewn throughout her compelling story.
I love Atwood and purchased this book as soon as it was available. Oryx and Crake is one of her best (though Blind Assassin and Alias Grace are my favs), and although I wasn't disappointed with the sequel, I don't feel that it was exciting or interesting as the initial story.