The Robber Bride

Description

From Library Journal Petite Tony teaches the agressively male subject of military history and has a talent for speaking backwards; actually, she's Ynot. Charis eats only vegetarian fare and consults crystals. Boisterous, stylish Roz runs her own company and drives a BMW. These three women would seem to have little in common, but they're held together by a single thread: Zenia, a lying, charismatic femme fatale who at one time or other stole the men in their lives. But Zenia is dead, blown to bits in Beirut, and can hurt them no more. Or so they think until the day a still-seductive Zenia walks into the restaurant where they are having lunch. As in Cat's Eye ( LJ 2/1/89), Atwood takes feminism one step further, showing women as victims not only of society but of themselves. Her book is daring, richly detailed, and compulsively readable. Indeed, some readers might find it too readable; at times it feels a bit trashier than something you would expect from Atwood. In addition, while Zenia is a fascinating absence at the novel's center, she seems too bad to be true. Nevertheless, Atwood is always good reading. For most collections. Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 7/93.- Barbara Hoffert, "Library Journal"Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. Read more From Kirkus Reviews Antonia (Tony), Karen (Charis), and Roz are three 50-ish Toronto friends, pals since college, all of whom have had to negotiate (and none too well) the treacheries of another friend, Zenia--someone who in the past has stolen a significant man from each of the others. But Zenia, they are led relievedly to understand, has been dead for some years--blown up in a Beirut bomb blast; they had carefully attended, together, her memorial service to make doubly sure. Yet why does the very selfsame Zenia now appear across the room one afternoon at a restaurant where the three women are lunching? It creates turmoil. Tony--a college military historian with a milquetoasty composer husband and an annoying tic of spelling words backwards; doggedly hippie Charis, New Age-y survivor of incest, and lover of a US draft-dodger; and Roz, power-businesswoman despite herself, wife of a sad-sack philanderer-- all of the massed trio views Zenia not only as a communal threat, but as a chastening, changeable contrast to the courses of their own lives. Atwood (Wilderness Tips, 1991; Cat's Eye, 1989, etc.) does a professionally tidy job with the outline of this social comedy, but apart from some poetic turbocharging around Charis's memories of abuse, plus a nice capture of modern manners most of the time, the book lacks luster: it could be a more brittle, smarter Rona Jaffe novel. Atwood seems to want to make the three unlikely friends both representative of their age, place, and times--but also not: the flaky names and square-peg lifestyles argue for an individualism none of the women quite achieves. And Zenia, the fox among these chickens, is utterly cloudy, a trope instead of a character. Amusing sometimes, but flogged and padded--hardly one of Atwood's better efforts. -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. Read more See all Editorial Reviews

Features:

Product Details:

• Hardcover: 466 pages
• Publisher: Nan A. Talese; 1st edition (October 1, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385260083
• ISBN-13: 84
• Product Dimensions: 7 x 1.2 x 9.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds

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