A review by masonanddixon
The Heart Goes Last by Margaret Atwood

3.0

Dull, for the most part. Attempts to straddle the line between blown out suburban satire (focusing on the absurd amoral lengths people go for comfort) and novel of the times. Unfortunately, it's neither funny enough, nor real to enough to succeed at either. All political heft this may have is squashed when Atwood refocuses the novel from a societal satire to one squarely on the American ideal of the housewife. I'm all for pointing out how good natured liberals can be put off by What Is to Be Done, but the way Atwood goes about it with the Charmaine and Stan characters betrays her more conservative sensibilities. Otherwise, she's still an excellent writer of views. The novel oscillates between Stan and Charmaine chapters. By shear tone you're able to tell who's view the chapter is in within a few words, and the characters, while broad, nonetheless remain consistent yet dynamic. All that being said, if I'm between an Atwood dystopia, bound to be full of a clarity of vision mostly unrivaled since Le Guin and Wolfe's passing, or a dime a binding dystopian novel with a title like Cities of Demons, I'll go with the Atwood.