The Power by Naomi Alderman

Rebecca’s pick this time around was The Power by Naomi Alderman.  The book synopsis is that young women start to develop the power to emit electricity from their hands.  It starts out as a strange phenomenon at first, but eventually sweeps the world as women harness, control, and heighten their abilities and pass the power to all women. As you can imagine, the entire dynamic of the world changes.  The story follows the lives of several characters allowing different facets of society to be explored including religion, politics, counter movements, and the black market.

We all thought the premise of the book was very intriguing.  (What group of women doesn’t welcome the idea of being able to walk down a dark alley with absolute confidence?)  However, the consensus was that the book became too violent and graphic. Many of us wanted the message of the book to be different.  But the book did serve as a catalyst for interesting discussions about feminism and politics.

As usual, Rebecca hosted a fabulous lunch.