The Heart Goes Last: A Novel

In my late teens and early twenties Margaret Atwood was one of my favorite writers.... and then she got weird. I just finished reading her new book The Heart Goes Last. How disappointing. None of the characters were likeable and the story was both far fetched and kind of raunchy in a "gross-why-am-i-reading-this?" sort of way. Don't waste your time or money.

This was a very slight chapter, and I have to wonder why it took so long between chapters. I am a fan of much of Atwood's work, but had this chapter been the first of her books I had read, I would not bother with her again. The plot advanced very little, especially when you consider the previous three chapters, and I am left to conclude that the author is spinning this story out purely with money in mind, and little concern for her literary reputation. Phoning it in comes to mind.

I'm a big fan of Margaret Atwood but this series is a disappointment. I can't help but feel nickle and dimed for every skimpy chapter. Episode 4 was particularly bad and ridiculously short. I don't even care enough about the characters or where the story is going to bother getting episode 5.

This might just be the worst book I have ever read. I bought it because it was on the NY Times best seller list. I honestly have no idea how that even happened. The only positive thing I can take from reading this book is that it gives me hope that I, too, can make the best seller list one day. I have it one star because it wouldn't let me write a review if I didn't.

Sad to say, I found the basic premise of this satiric, dystopian novel (can we please cease, for a goodly period, this overused genre?) upon which the plot rests is ludicrous. Despite the plot and character twists, the protagonists remain one dimensional. There is nothing of the horrific grandeur of the execution of the woman who aborted her foetus in "The Handmaid'sTale." The plot feels awkward, cramped, and suffers from a surfeit of "wryness."
I feel like Ms. Atwood has tossed out a softball. There will be no convincing die-hard fans of the weaknesses in this novel. A shame - because at her best, her writing is honed, startling and beautifully penned.

This is one piece of s*** book. I never write reviews - but this book is so bad I felt I must, as a public service. I love a good dystopian novel. I loved "A Handmaid's Tale". This book had a potential premise. Then it turned into Elvis impersonators and some woman who was surgically altered, resulting in a fetish attraction for a knitted blue teddy bear (which fortunately she can carry around in her purse). Save your money, and your time. Huge waste of both.

I received this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

Well Atwood does it again. She somehow manages to create a world that both intrigues me and terrifies me. Like many people, Stan and Charmaine lost everything with the great economic collapse. Before the collapse, they are newly married and living paycheck to paycheck. Then the collapse happens and they lose their jobs, along with their house. Charmaine works a part time job that barely feeds them, so they live in their car and dumpster dive for food. Then what seems like a miracle: they are offered a place in Positron, a society where the citizens actually take turns living in prison. It's all very weird and kind of crazy, but I have to admit that I would be tempted too. It's this supposed paradise, where they get a regular paycheck and a house and a job. Even when they take their turns in prison, it doesn't really seem like jail. The food is amazing and they all have their duties and stations. One month, they are in prison and the next month, they return to their house where they live as a married couple. During the time when they are in prison, another married couple lives in their home. Trouble arises when Charmaine starts having sex with the married man who lives in her house while she isn't there.

Okay, so the world Atwood built is disturbing and chilling. In the synopsis, it is described as hilarious as well. I think this was supposed to be a dark comedy, but I didn't really find much funny about it. It was hard to warm up to either one of the main characters. I couldn't tell if they loved each other or not. Charmaine is having an affair with the married man who lives in her house when she is in prison. It's like she is two different people: when she is with Stan, she seems to love him but then she meets that other guy and suddenly she can't help but have sex with him. And the sex is quite degrading. Actually, much of the sexual stuff in here is meant to make women into victims. Stan talks of rape and domestic violence as if he commits those acts on a regular basis. Actually, all the men in this book are portrayed as sexual predators and the women are portrayed as very docile creatures . . . except for maybe Jocelyn, but I don't want to give too much away about her. I could still relate to both Stan and Charmaine though. They are both looking for a better life and thinks this is the perfect answer. They just don't realize how much freedom they have to give up. And that is one of the major themes in the book: is it really worth giving up some liberties so that you can have security?

One issue I did have was that the sexism and objectification of women seemed like it was more for shock value than anything else. It just seemed like every single man was labeled a predator and there was no clear motive for the people running the society. Was it about the money or was it about trying to domesticate women? It was so hard to tell. I was also kind of bored towards the end of the book. The first 70% of the book had me eagerly turning the page to see what would happen to the characters and what would happen to the fake society. But then, the action just . . . stopped. And as far as endings go, this one was not my favorite. It seemed hastily thrown together and there were a couple of things that happened to the men that I think were supposed to be good things. But I didn't see it as a very happy ending.

I am a huge fan of Margaret Atwood and she does an awesome job creating a dystopian society that will give you chills. But the pacing and lack of characterization with this one makes it one of my least favorites.

Atwood has always been great at dystopian fiction and in the past I have found her to be a very imaginative writer. However, the future portrayed here is a bit… absurd. And not in the awesomely creepy sci-fi way, either. The premise is interesting at first, but rapidly fizzles out as we get drawn deeper into the characters’ petty lives.

The two main characters, a young married couple, quickly turn out to be shallow, sex-crazed, and extremely selfish. Stan the husband has anger issues, fantasizes about rape, and wants to have sex with absolutely everyone, including chickens. When not busy cheating on Stan, Charmaine is over-the-top perky, cute (think adorable nonswears like ‘witch’ and ‘heck’) and, let’s face it, kind of a dumb bimbo. As the book went on, it became more and more of a struggle to even attempt to empathize with these two. I didn’t feel any kind of an emotional attachment towards them or any of the characters in the story. And I got really tired of reading about who wanted to screw who.

In the second half of the book, the plot becomes very implausible and far-fetched. There is a convoluted and unnecessarily intricate scheme to smuggle a person out of Consilience. It involves Las Vegas, Elvis impersonators, the Green Man Group, sex robots, brain operations, and oh so much more. This is where the novel really took a nosedive and I just couldn’t buy into all the absurdity. I slogged through chapters upon chapters of dress-up, sex with teddy bears, and characters making one odd decision after another.
In the end, I wasn’t sure what the moral of the story was intended to be. Maybe it was something like: marriage sucks. Or: sex is the only thing that makes people happy. Whatever Atwood’s motivation for The Heart Goes Last, I was left feeling let down as a reader.

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE don’t let this novel be your introduction to Atwood’s usually wonderful prose. I don’t know why this particular book was such a clumsy and silly affair, and it is nowhere near up to her usual standards. I highly recommend reading some of her other works, particularly The Blind Assassin and Oryx and Crake.

This most recent of Atwood's novels is framed within her now characteristic post-apocalyptic society -- only this society isn't in *complete* ruins. We find that while the majority of the U.S. has experienced some sort of prolonged and severely damaging economic collapse, there are still areas for which society seems to be "normal" -- Vegas, for example, other parts of the Western U.S., and some other parts of the world. The two main characters, a married couple consisting of a former robotics factory worker, Stan, and his perky and somewhat gullible wife Charmaine, seek to escape their increasingly perilous existence living in their car by signing up for a new experiment carried out by those who think they have the solution to the widespread crime and vagrancy in the U.S.

Without saying much more about exactly what this solution entails, I will say that the novel is about choices: choices the characters have to make, certainly, but also choices that we as readers might be confronted with while thinking about this novel. And here is where Atwood's title seems to come in. "The heart goes last" is a phrase uttered/thought at least twice in the first half of the book alone, but I can't give you context here without spoiling the plot. However, one thing to think about if you're deciding to buy this book, *is* the title: is it a metaphorical directive? Should we hold back our emotions while making decisions? (or, are our emotions the last, and therefore best guide, to what we should do?) Or is it simply a biological observation to define who is still living?

Readers of Atwood's previous novels will find much here to satisfy them. I have to say that I was more pleased with this one than even _Alias Grace_ (which I only mention now because I read it most recently); this one is far more of a page-turner. I think the only criticism I have is that the main "solution" to society's ills, Positron, isn't developed enough in the beginning of the novel, where it counts most; I wondered about its believability, despite the novel clearly being set in an alternate future. But, if you can get past it -- which actually isn't difficult since Atwood's writing is so good -- I think you'll enjoy how the story unfolds. There are surprises: some things I predicted, only with the wrong person(s); other things I didn't see coming at all.

I should also note that, as usual with Atwood's longer works, this one's not for kids. Much of the plot moves with sex -- the characters' desires, and sometimes their enacting those desires -- so I'd caution readers who don't dig dirty pillow talk, or sex spelled out. But it's *not* a cheesy romance novel. I need to write that. (And also, in all reality, the sex here is nothing that we don't already see on HBO.) Still, I'd be *mostly* comfortable teaching this novel in a college course (and definitely an upper-level one on Atwood, or dystopia, or robots, or surveillance...) -- but heavens no, I'd not order it up for a high school English class. I'd have h to pay from the parents for every 40 page reading assignment.

A very strange read, entertaining but also disturbing. Disturbing in that it will at times send chills down your spine, yet a few pages later you will be laughing at some of the bizarre events!
The future is bleak for Stan and Charmaine who at the beginning of the novel are living in their car, in a desperate state. They apply to become part of a social experiment that offers them both work and a home, which although it rescues them, in return they become part of something very sinister. One month in prison working alternates with one month in their own home. A home which by the way they share with another couple, swapping from prison to home with this other couple. They develop an obsession with their counterparts and life becomes rather complicated. Scary in a way as though this is far from reality it so easily could be!

Margaret Atwood’s The Heart Goes Last is a strange beast, but not one that I can recommend.

Conceptually, the book is terrific – Atwood presents us with an economically wreaked near-future America and the married couple of Charmaine and Stan. They live in their car, after deserting the home they could no longer afford, while she works at a bar making enough money to keep their vehicle in gas. When the opportunity arrives to apply to the Positron Project, she leaps at it, and soon enough she and Stan are enrolled. Those admitted into the program alternate months between the town of Consilience and the Poistron project, living as inmates. While they’re in prison, an alternate couple lives in their home, the two flip-flopping in and out of the residence in accordance with the project’s guidelines.

There’s an edgy darkness to the story that I liked, particularly as the couple grow more deeply aware of the corporate surveillance state they find themselves living in. After Charmaine is caught having an affair with another Consilience citizen, both she and her husband are wrapped up in a spider’s web of secrets that soon boils over into conspiracy and manipulation.

However, I never really bought into the very abrupt affair between Charmaine and her alternate Max, which begins with nary a prompt. After Stan discovers a note left for Max, sticking out from under the refrigerator, signed by “Jasmine” and sealed with a kiss, he begins to unravel, intent on winning Jasmine’s love, thinking that Jasmine is Max’s wife. He goes into full-blown psycho-stalker mode, which leads me to my next problem.

Neither of the leads are the least bit sympathetic, and they are only marginally interesting in their contradictions. It’s not long before you realize just how broken and artificial their marriage is. Much like the Poistron Project itself, both have a certain superficial veneer, but each is rotten to the core. Stan is a sex obsessed creep with anger management issues and a number of rapey impulses who wants to bang anything with a pulse, including the chickens he oversees during his time in prison, and the sexbots introduced in the book’s last third, programmed to give the appearance of a pulse.

Most of the novel’s first-half feels a bit soggy from the rinse-and-repeat narrative in which Stan lusts for sex with Charmaine, Charmaine has sex with Max, Stan lusts for sex with Jasmine and plots ways to track her down before they alternate their lives between the city and prison. This first half, though, feels long and plodding and I spent most of the book wishing I could move onto some other title rather than continuing to engage in a progressively growing number of pointlessly mundane exercises that make up these chapters. It’s not until the last half of the book, or perhaps even later, when things finally pick up and take on the bent of a paranoid conspiracy thriller. Unfortunately, this devolves into sheer absurdity with a finale involving a handful of Elvis and Marilyn Monroe impersonators.

Ultimately, I feel largely ambivalent about The Heart Goes Last, falling somewhere between “didn’t like it” and “meh.” I’d recommend skipping this one.

[This review is based on an advanced copy received from the publisher via NetGalley.]

This review is for the audiobook version of the tale.

First, as a fan of Atwood's works for decades now, I agree with many others that this isn't her best work. While the world building is fantastic, the small head nods to current events delightfully sharp-edged, the tale interesting in itself, the characters are simply yucky people. It's hard to connect with any characters in this tale in any way. That is exceptionally rare for anything Atwood writes, so I'm confused as to how this happened. Where was the honesty when she turned in this manuscript?

Even so, I enjoyed it, because well...Atwood.

As to the audio version, once again they've hit it out of the park. I wish whoever produced and directed her books would magically come within my reach! The two voices were perfectly acted, emphasizing exactly right. Well acted, no question.

If you're a diehard Atwood fan and simply must read her entire body of work, then this is a fine volume, but it won't change your world. Perhaps you'll take away a few nuggets that will raise eyebrows when watching the various antics of the rich and evil, but otherwise, that wonderfully deep tale that crawls inside a mind is missing here. If you're simply browsing for something to read and haven't yet tried an Atwood, don't let this be your first. It will bias you.

If there’s anything Canada’s expertly provocative Margaret Atwood can do better than just about every major writer of this century, it’s zeroing in on our most sensitive discomfort zones --- not just some of them, but pretty much all of them.

THE HEART GOES LAST, Atwood's newest literary assault on North American complacency and paranoia, checks all the emotional, sensual, spiritual and intellectual boxes where discomfort can reside. Even her gritty humor operates in ambush mode; you’re never quite ready for it. There are simply no protected arm’s-length angles from which to hover in some kind of sterile detachment as yet another of her future-world scenarios unfolds into an inscrutable, bittersweet conclusion.

Atwood’s surreal tale opens with Stan and Charmaine, a feckless but oddly likable young urban couple living in their decrepit car after being swallowed up in the tsunami of economic collapse. Their prospects seem hopeless, and their relationship hangs by a thread.

The timing of their situation --- job loss, mortgage default, bankruptcy, home abandonment --- is hideously apropos. There’s nothing futuristic about the social geography of THE HEART GOES LAST for countless Canadians and Americans left high and dry by the relentless erosion of once-solid manufacturing jobs, the oil-sector employment crash, the subprime mortgage scandal, and a steady decline of basic social services in both countries. The European Union is experiencing its own social and economic woes, exacerbated by a mass influx of refugees from genocidal civil warfare in places like Syria.

Into this pessimistic swamp of global calamities, Atwood parachutes one of her typically preposterous alternative society concepts. It’s the kind of thing fans have come to love and even expect of her --- the utopian ideal repositioned for our age, subtly twisted off-center, and then (not so subtly) turned on its butt end.

Charmaine and Stan learn of a town called Consilience, a brand new self-sustaining gated community built around a privatized former federal prison. The name means “convicts-plus-resilience” for reasons the couple discovers when they adopt its interesting lifestyle. Entry is rigorously controlled, but they apply on a desperate whim and are miraculously accepted.

The town’s chief “industry” is a complex and shadowy entity called the Positron Project. What it produces gets into rather squeamish and “spoiler” territory. Suffice it to say that Charmaine is one of those special individuals whose temperament is ideally suited to gently “relocating” imported criminals and other undesirables into the afterlife. She feels very fulfilled in her top-secret Medical Administration post, giving this essential service to the less fortunate.

But that’s not all that goes on behind the weird science façade of the Positron scheme, whose publicity spin doctors are as well-oiled performers as any televangelist. Where there’s power, money and lust (usually working in combination), even the most precisely organized “perfect” society inevitably breaks down from within. The superficial prosperity of Consilience covers a growing web of dissent, and, of course, the semi-clueless Stan and Charmaine are quickly entangled.

As they are drawn into a chaotic and bizarrely funny (yes, funny!) existence of mixed messages, orchestrated deceptions, fake deaths and covert escapes, the pair are separated, challenged, exploited, betrayed and finally reunited. They begin a new life in a better version of the “outside” than they came in with. They start a family. They remain (more or less) the same people after their grand adventure in Consilience. Or do they?

The ending of THE HEART GOES LAST is eerily telling. Assured by a former Positron bigwig that they are indeed free of obligations to anyone and anything, and can live their lives as they wish, Charmaine asks vacantly, “How do you mean?”

Indeed. Once again, the truly iconic Margaret Atwood has kept us eagerly uncomfortable from beginning to end.

Reviewed by Pauline Finch

After the brilliance that was the Maddaddam series, I was so excited for Atwood's latest novel. However, having finished it last night, I can't believe how disappointed I am with this book. The writing felt very pedestrian, very much not in Atwood's usual eloquent language. The storyline itself had a great concept of people living in prison every other month, but this too was eventually relegated to the background. As another reviewer said, it feels mainly about love triangles, who is betraying who, etc. I found none of the characters very likable, but kept reading to hopefully get some magical Atwood twist, but it just spiraled down to a close.

This felt like such a departure from her other works that I consider close to masterpieces. There was no reward to this book.

In The Heart Goes Last, Atwood has created a creepy dystopic world where part of the population is living well below the poverty line while the other part is living a life of luxury and excess. Atwood’s protagonists, Stan and Charmaine, are from the poor part of the population, and they begin the novel in a state of dangerous transience, living out of their old car and dumpster-diving for food. Once part of the middle class, Stan and Charmaine are willing to do almost anything to get back some semblance of the stability they enjoyed in their former lives, including making a bargain with their lives that ends up having seriously unpleasant (and seemingly permanent) consequences. I won’t say more about the specifics of the plot because that would ruin the twists and turns along the way, but I will say that the title comes from the fact that the heart is the last body part to stop functioning after the body receives a fatal injection of poison.

Atwood does an excellent job creating a vision of the future that seems realistic, scarily so. The Heart Goes Last is a page-turner and raises interesting questions about what we might be willing to give up in exchange for comforts like a warm bed and plush towels. There is also a lot in here about marriage, fidelity, and the role of sex in our lives and relationships. At times, I felt the book went on a bit longer than it needed to in places, but I was mostly happy to go along for the ride.

I'm writing from outside the Positron series knowledge loop. I'm just someone who has been reading Atwood's novels since her early days and, to put it bluntly, I found this one dreadful. It reads something like the comic version of The Handmaid's Tale, but the result is "humor" that's very broad and very silly, relying heavily on the sort of visual jokes that Marilyn Monroe and Elvis Presley love dolls can offer. There are no characters, only caricatures. Atwood is witty, and the caricatures are well done, but caricatures can't sustain an entire book. The plot is absurd. In the absence of any fully drawn human figures or plausible narrative, the dystopian village in which the novel is mostly set isn't menacing, just boring.

I'm half pleased to find out that Atwood appears to have written this very tedious work on purpose. I was afraid her creative well had gone dry and she was dashing of fluff pieces like this one just to make a buck, hoping to sell it to her unsuspecting loyal fans. My other half is angry that I wasted time and money on a book that is so far inferior to much of the fine work she has done in the past.

My third half is reminding myself to read the reviews before I buy the book.

They lost almost everything when the economy went belly up and now they lived in their car. Stan was getting tired of the situation while Charmaine tried to remain positive although her new working conditions at the Pixel Dust bar, were less than ideal. When Charmaine saw the commercial for the Positron Project, she knew this was their way out.

The Positron Project was a serious commitment and as the couple was put through a screening process and a waiting period, Stan’s brother tried to warn him about the dangers in his future. Charmaine already had made up her mind though.

The project. Who thinks of these things? As I read about this idea, I had to wonder about this author and how she came up with this idea. Then, I thought about the individuals who had signed up for this type of society, freely without any pressure. Life on the outside must have been pretty miserable for them. Did they really know what lies ahead for their future?

The project runs on a monthly cycle. One month an individual or a couple would live in a house and they would be treated as civilians. At the end of the month, they would go to their lockers and change their clothes. Putting on their prisoner apparel, they would now become prisoners for a month and live in another section of the project. This same exchange would occur with individuals who were prisoners last month, only they would now be putting on civilian clothes and they now would be living in the houses that the civilians just left. It’s an exchange program. The same people live in the same house only in different times, cleaning up after themselves before they leave. These individuals are to never, ever see who they share their houses with.

If you think about the tone within the project, things have to be running pretty smoothly. As a resident, you experience both ends of the spectrum.

For Charmaine and Stan, they were enjoying the project. Life seemed easier, they both had jobs and knew what was expected of them but of course, they hit a bump as Stan makes a discovery. The novel got pretty interesting then as it was one twist after another until I wasn’t sure what the heck was happening. There’s this master plan, I know there had to be, but who was in charge and what was the purpose?

I felt like an investigator, leaping around, keeping track of all the dirt I was uncovering. By the time the whole plan was ironed out, I was shaking my head. I felt like I had been bounced around in a pinball machine during that second half of the novel. That was crazy. I liked parts of it as I felt it was very creative and interesting and there were other parts that I thought were confusing and rushed.

It is after I have finished this novel that I am told that this is part of a series, I don’t know if I will read the others in the series. I’ll need to read the synopsis but I think I should have read the first book to help me understand this book better.

(Full disclosure: I received a free electronic ARC for review through Edelweiss. Trigger warning for rape and violence. This review contains clearly marked spoilers.)

“Never mind which wife is whose,” says Jocelyn. “We can’t waste time on the sexual spaghetti.”

###

How bad are things when you can get nostalgic about living in your car?

###

The dystopian society at the heart of THE HEART GOES LAST is surprisingly mundane – which makes it all the more chilling. Stan and Charmaine live in the northeastern United States, which has been hit especially hard by the latest recession. Things went to rats**t seemingly overnight (“Someone had lied, someone had cheated, someone had shorted the market, someone had inflated currency. Not enough jobs, too many people.”). Charmaine’s company, an upscale retirement chain called Ruby Slippers, scaled back its eastern operations, leaving Charmaine out of a job; Stan’s position at Dimple Robotics soon followed. They held onto their cozy starter home as long as they could, but before you can say “outsourcing,” they’d lost that too. From solidly middle class to homeless, in the blink of an eye.

Now they sleep in their car, surviving on the meager wages Charmaine earns waiting tables in a seedy bar, desperately searching for work and trying to stay ahead of the roving gangs of thieves and rapists that own the streets come nightfall. So when Charmaine spots an ad for the Positron Project – an experimental city/prison in Consilience – the two are understandably quick to sign their lives away. Full employment, zero crime, free housing – and the only way you can leave is in a pine box. But why would anyone want to abandon the safety of these walls to go back out there? You can’t eat freedom, yo.

Their first year in Consilience goes surprisingly well: Stan is assigned a job repairing scooters, and Charmaine works at one of the city’s bakeries. Every other month, they leave their two-bedroom house and enter the Positron prison, where it’s their turn to serve as prisoners. (“CONSILIENCE = CONS + RESILIENCE. DO TIME NOW, BUY TIME FOR OUR FUTURE!”) Though the amenities are a little less comfy, it’s not all that different from civilian life (save for the gender segregation, of course): Stan is in charge of the prison’s chicken farm, while Charmaine is Chief Medications Administrator in the prison hospital.

While they’re in the slammer, their Alternates occupy their home, and vice versa. No one’s supposed to know who their Alternates are, for obvious reasons: fights over sloppily trimmed hedges and dirty bathrooms are sure to ensue. But when Stan finds a saucy love letter under his fridge – addressed to Max from Jasmine and sealed with a fuschia kiss – he can’t purge fantasies of Charmaine’s Alternate from his mind. Before long, he graduates from obsession to stalking, bugging her scooter in the hopes of arranging a “chance” meeting – which will culminate in Jasmine giving in to his every whim. Naturally.

For Jasmine is everything Charmaine is not: Uninhibited. Passionate. Impulsive. Insatiable. A w-h-o-r-e to Charmaine’s prim and proper Madonna. Except not: Charmaine is Jasmine, and she’s been having a hot-n-heavy affair with Stan’s Alternate Max. Whose real name is Phil. Phil the sex addict, married to Jocelyn of Surveillance, who just so happens to be a co-founder of Positron. Enter the intrigue, suspense, and crazy weird long cons, as Stan finds himself sucked into Jocelyn’s marital mind games and corporate espionage. In a twist everyone saw coming, Positron is even more sinister than it appears on the surface – and Jocelyn needs Stan’s help to upend the system.

THE HEART GOES LAST is like a Russian Nesting Doll of plots and subplots: a dystopia wrapped in a portrait of a highly dysfunctional marriage, all nestled in a sometimes-comical critique of the prison-industrial complex. Just when you think you know where the story’s headed, Atwood pulls the tastefully decorated, retro ’50s rug out from under you. Yet while I adored the individual components, many of them so absurd and thoroughly Atwoodian – headless chickens, fed through tubes inserted directly into their necks (“humane” meat, anyone?); sexbots, custom-made to look like your favorite celeb, that hot barista at Starbucks who wouldn’t touch you with a ten-foot pole, or a seven-year-old kid, if that’s your thing; stealing the blood OF BABIES – they didn’t quite add up to my (admittedly high) expectations.

Let’s take the Positron prison, which stretched my credulity somewhat. Each citizen spends one month as a citizen, and the next as a prisoner, on a rotating schedule. This guarantees a 50% incarceration rate, which would presumably be impossible otherwise. (Try as we might, the United States has only reached .716%.)

The question I have is: why? Why would such a high incarceration rate be desirable? It’s not like removing half the population from the citizenry reduces competition for jobs; everyone in the prison is assigned a job, such that every resident has two jobs, which rotate with their place of residence. It does create some unnecessary jobs in the form of prison guards, I suppose. But absent a prison these folks could be employed in a more productive and profitable way, such as knitting teddy bears for export or assembling sexbots (euphemistically called Possibilibots by the higher-ups).

I suppose the cells do cut down on housing costs, but if that’s the case, why not just have everyone live in dorms? It’s still worlds better than living outside the walls.

Then again, this could be a commentary on the prison-industrial complex itself – and the trend towards privatizing prisons, in particular. For-profit prisons don’t operate with the social good in mind; they’re in the business of making money. A high recidivism rate? Awesome! Repeat customers. College education and job training? What for? We want these people to come back, not function in the real world. The more people they can lock up, the fatter the bottom line. Of course, the Positron prison is practically a day spa compared to, say, Rikers. After they purged it of the “real” prisoners, anyway.

** begin spoilers **

Another thing you should know about The Heart Goes Last: there is a s*** ton of rape. Like, I’ve come to expect it in dystopias, but this seemed excessive even to me. And worse, the characters don’t always recognize it as such. I hope that readers will prove more astute, but you never know.

It all starts with Stan and Jocelyn. In order to get revenge on her cheating, sex addict husband Phil, Jocelyn switches his schedule with Stan’s; Stan gets an extra month as a civilian, but the downside is that he has to spend it living with Jocelyn. She shows him the recordings of Charmaine and Phil bumping uglies in abandoned homes all over Consilience – and then demands that they recreate the scenes. She’s in Surveillance and he’s just been caught bugging his wife’s scooter, so poor Stan doesn’t have much say in the matter. This is rape, and it goes on for months.

Later on, when a reconciliation between Stan and Charmaine looks possible, Stan worries how he will explain this “affair” to his wife; in the grand scheme of things, the tally should ring up even, since she also cheated on him. Except he didn’t cheat on her: he was raped. That’s a crucial distinction. One that Jocelyn acknowledges but refuses to give import when she’s blackmailing Stan yet again down the line.

The specter of rape rears its ugly head again vis-à-vis the sexbots. Stan goes undercover in the factory where they’re assembled; when the grand tour reveals bots that resemble kids, Stan is understandably repulsed. (Stan, who pimped out chickens – albeit under duress – during his tenure as Poultry Supervisor in the prison. Stan, who considered raping a chicken himself. Not under duress, just run of the mill sexual frustration.) Thus ensues a spirited debate about whether such outlets will ultimately keep pedophiles from raping real children.

An interesting side note about the Possibilibots: While the technology is hella advanced and the business quite lucrative, so far scientists have been unable to replicate the full range of human facial expressions – and doubt they ever will. Close, but no dice.

Instead of trying to recreate the hardware, then, Positron has decided to steal it. Humans are kidnapped, subjected to risky neurosurgery designed to erase their previous attachments to others, and then “imprinted” on their new owners (there’s really no better word for it), much like chicks with their mum. The first thing with eyes that a newly created sex slave sees upon wakening will be her (or his) sole source of desire forevermore. Why replicate that snooty barisata witch when you can literally make her love you? I can just pictures the MRAs crowding in line, screaming SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONIES!!!!

Again, just to be clear: this is rape. Consent is meaningless if you’ve literally stripped the victim of free will.

And so it goes with Ed, the now-rogue co-founder of Positron whose rule Jocelyn hopes to overthrow. He becomes infatuated with Charmaine; commissions a replica of her (for which he bugs her bathroom, to get accurate photos for the blueprint); all with the ultimate goal of snatching her during a business trip to Las Vegas and having her brain rewired. So yeah, I’ll go with Stan: a kiddybot will only work for so long. Escalation is the name of the game.

Which brings me to perhaps my biggest problem with The Heart Goes Last: the unsatisfying denouement. Some of the story’s villains are punished, but in an Old Testament kinda way that’s difficult to celebrate. Ed is made into a sexbot for reporter Lucinda Quant, a cancer survivor who hopes to rekindle her career by breaking the Positron scandal. Punishing a rapist with rape? Highly problematic.

Yet Ed’s not the only one to come to such a fate: Jocelyn’s cheating husband Phil is rewired into a sex slave for her co-conspirator Aurora, in exchange for her help, and Charmain is imprinted on Stan as a reward for smuggling valuable information out of Positron. While Phil might indeed be human excrement, the worst he ever did (at least that we know of) is run around on his wife; and, though Charmaine is indeed a murderer, Stan’s impetus for subjecting her to the procedure isn’t punishment, but possession. Gross gross gross.

** end spoilers **

As with many Margaret Atwood novels, the ending is pretty wide open – think Offred’s escape from a still-functioning Gilead in THE HANDMAID’S TALE – which isn’t always my favorite, but I can work with it. Using rape as a punishment – as the only form of punishment – doesn’t sit too well with me, however.

The final verdict: THE HEART GOES LAST isn’t Margaret Atwood’s best – but it’s still Margaret Atwood. I’d do it again in a heartbeat. I’m a ginormous Margaret Atwood fangirl, okay.

Margaret Atwood’s novel, The Heart Goes Last is a fine example of the author’s creativity and of her psychological knowledge of the human spirit.

Under the best conditions, Stan and Charmaine’s marriage was far from perfect. But now homeless and living in their car, they can barely tolerate their situation. Caught at a weak point in their lives, they jump at the chance to live in a gated community called Consilience, have jobs, eat regular food and live in a clean environment. They’re so desperate they don’t realize they were making a life-long commitment to a one-way gated community.

Once through orientation, Stan and Charmaine move into their new home. Well, their part-time home. It’s a one-month on, one-month off arrangement. While in their home, they have jobs and even freedom within the community, but then all that ends and they move into a prison for a month, live separately, and have jobs there. The alternate couple leave their prison jobs and move into their mutual home.

The glamor begins to wear off when a series of troubling events surface. Stan and Charmaine realize their lives are not their own, they have no choices. They are caught up in a high tech, manipulative world. Their disillusion deepens as they realize they’re committed for life. Will there be no escape?

The Heart Goes Last has it’s humorous elements as it delves into the deepest recesses of the human mind and heart. But it’s troubling, too, when you realize the situations depicted are actually plausible. It’s high-tech gone haywire.

I read that this book is Margaret Atwood’s first stand-alone novel in a decade. I was not aware that part of this story had been previously released as an eBook. I’ve seen other authors I like mention Margaret Atwood, and when I saw this on NetGalley, I just had to request it.

The story is a little slow at first. I think I stopped reading for the night at around 30% or so. The next night I read again, and I did not want to put it down. (I had to get some sleep before work, so I had to.) The tension keeps increasing and the ending is fun. The villains were easy to hate, and I ended up liking more than one.

Charmaine seemed to have a pendulum swing between likable and deplorable, which reminds me of real-life people - with all our foibles, and our flaws – good, bad and indifferent.

The feeling of the book is bleak with a sort of dark humor that made me LOL at least once. I’m not sure if it was intentional, but I gleaned a commentary about love, marriage, sex, and what we as a people are willing to do for comfort.

I hope to read more by Atwood, as I really enjoyed The Heart Goes Last.

Described as “wittily funny” and “utterly brilliant” I found it neither, though it was intriguing, so I stayed with it. The economy has tanked in the U.S. and anarchy is just beginning to bare its ugly teeth. Stan and Charmaine are without jobs or house (they lost it when they could no longer make the payments), and they’re living in their car, moving constantly to avoid roaming gangs and sleeping only in snatches. Charmaine does work a few hours in a dive bar; her best friends now are prostitutes who service their customers in the back room.

So when Charmaine sees an ad on TV for the Positron Project in the town of Consilience the couples decides they have nothing to lose. They board a bus for the complimentary trip, they’re wined and dined and put up in a nice hotel—hot showers! fresh bedsheets! wine with dinner! Not everyone gets in, mind you, and Stan and Charmaine go through a series of workshops meant to weed out the undesirables.

If they make it, a house in the cute little 50s-era town of Consilience is theirs. The catch? They spend 30 days in the Positron Prison and 30 days as townspeople for the rest of their lives. Because there’s no leaving the Project once you sign on the dotted line. The town’s motto? “Do time now, buy time for our future. Cons + Resilience = Consilience”. Yikes.

The rest of the novel is a whirl of selective euthanasia and sex robots and Elvis impersonators and an attempted escape to Las Vegas, of all places! That, and some sort of sex imprinting brain surgery that backfires occasionally, leaving one woman with a fetish for a blue knit teddy bear. The Heart Goes Last is a little bit Truman Show, with a pinch of Stepford Wives and 1984, perhaps. (Here’s Atwood talking about the novel on NPR)

Originally written as a serial for the online publisher Byliner, the novel was entertaining—but The Heart Goes Last was no Handmaid’s Tale.

[read more at thisismysymphony.net]

It’s not really a prison, more of a social contract; you live in the community half the time, and the other half someone else has your home while you serve the community. Commitment, obedience, trust in authority—all of these will be fostered in prison time and all will be well. Plus everyone’s signed the contract, so they have to agree.

Of course, like any “perfect” form of government, the system might fall prey to temptation or corruption. In that gap between town-time and prison-time, what if you meet someone from the opposite schedule? What if your wife meets someone? What if…? And what if somewhere along the line you start wondering about the world outside, that fast-decaying world you left behind?

Margaret Atwood peoples her near-future cities and governments with convincing characters and logical motivations. It’s fascinating, oddly compelling… and suddenly it’s terrifying too in a novel whose second half becomes an exciting ride through technology, mystery and emotion. The reader is invited to wonder what makes us human, what makes emotions real, what constitutes deception, and do we really want to be responsible for our actions.

The Heart Goes Last offers insight into the human heart and questions how easily we might be deceived. It’s also a really good, if somewhat dystopian, read.

Disclosure: I bought it to read on a plane and I loved it.

Margaret Atwood earned a touch of literary immortality with the oft-read The Handmaids Tail. Since that award-winning novel was published in 1985, she has continued to write award-winning, sociologically challenging speculative fiction (a term she prefers to "science fiction"). Her 2015 novel The Heart Goes Last continues some of the themes of her earlier novels, but doesn't quite deliver the punch that her readers are accustomed to.

The Heart Goes Last is set in a company town. Residents who have run out of luck in the economy at large are invited to move into Consilience, a secure compound in which they will work, have a place to live, and lack for nothing. The catch is that for one month they will live and work freely at home, but every other month they have to be locked up in the prison on the grounds.

Things work out swimmingly for Stan and Charmaine for a while--until they don't. Charmaine has a forbidden fling, and works hard to cover it while she keeps it going. Meanwhile a rebellion is brewing in Consilience, and Charmaine gets wrapped up in it. When they do leave Consilience, the weirdness and randomness spins too far out of control.

I did not enjoy The Heart Goes Last as much as I have some of Atwood's other fiction. As original as she has been in her novels, this one felt more derivative, as if she had hopped on the bandwagon of post-apocalyptic teen fiction. Granted, many of her novels can be classified as post-apocalyptic, but I hadn't felt the Hunger Games vibe in the others like I did with this one. I also wasn't a big fan of her characters. Charmaine's fling is so out of character. Her lover and his co-conspirators seemed unconvincing to me. Charmaine's husband, Stan, poor guy, has a rough time. Justice is finally done, sort of, but I didn't particularly enjoy the path to get there.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the complimentary electronic review copy!

Margaret Atwood’s latest, “The Heart Goes Last”, is so funny, and so scary at the same time that I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry when I was done. At the start, we meet Stan and Charmaine, a recently married, once happy couple, now destitute, and living in their car. The backdrop is an economic collapse, in a political environment with no safety net. Those in the middle and lower ends (I guess the middle is not an end) of the economic scale are devastated. Stan and Charmaine are constantly on the run from would be robbers and murderers because of the economic devastation and because “only rich people can afford to have police”. Stan cannot find work anywhere and Charmaine is working in a bar which also serves as a brothel (not much activity in the bar, but the brothel part of the business is booming–sex is a theme of this book!). As you can imagine, living in a car in constant fear puts a damper on a relationship, not to mention the perspectives of the residents.

Stan reluctantly decides to visit his gangster brother to collect on some debts and at about the same time, Charmaine sees an ad for an idyllic living arrangement called the Positron Project in the town of Consilience. At the Positron Project, residents get a house and a job. They also get to spend every other month working and living in a prison, while another couple lives in their shared house. The arrangement sounds good to Stan and Charmaine (I told you that living in a car and escaping marauders can skew your perspective) and they sign up and move in. Positron has very strict rules, unexpected surveillance and dictatorial leadership. All goes well, for a while… And then things begin to go very, very wrong. There are desirable and undesirable sexual encounters, disappearances, sex robots, interesting medical procedures, unexpected interrelationships, gangsters and lots and lots of Elvis impersonators running around. And at the end (I won’t really give away the end), there is real life uncertainty.

All in all, the book feels like a light story, but of course it’s not. Although the book seems funny at times, Charmaine observes that “comedy is so cold and heartless, it makes fun of people’s sadness.” “The Heart Goes Last” is a story of what happens to human nature when life becomes hopeless–both from the perspective of the helpless and the perspective of those who capitalize on despair and hopelessness. And the story, in true Margaret Atwood fashion, highlights the need for opportunity, economic equality and honest, selfless and empathetic leadership, within a story that illustrates the possible impact of the loss of those qualities. The story also reminds us that things are not always as they seem and that human nature is complex and sometimes unpredictable. All in all, a good read.
If you like this review and would like to read more, please visit [...]

I love Margaret Atwood and her deliciously negative outlook on life. There is something quite exciting about her evident disappointment in the human race and the bleakness that she bleeds into her books. I don’t know why, perhaps it’s a fight against the enforced sickly sweetness of the world. The ‘let’s all be happy because everything is going to be alright’. Perhaps it’s that, or perhaps it’s just a delight to see something different for a change, to taste the sweet drops of the prohibited, the views you shouldn’t hold because where will negativity get you? Nowhere? Maybe though, just maybe, these brooding tales of woe are just what the doctor ordered when it comes to examining the ways we live and to stark warnings of what our future may behold – if we’re not careful, of course. Atwood is the queen of this, the queen of modern dystopia and this novel, The Heart Goes Last, is certainly no exception.

Stan and Charmaine live in their car. It wasn’t always like that. They had once had jobs they liked and a nice house but when the economy collapsed, so did their lives. All they were left with was their car, their love, and Charmaine’s job in the dingy bar, Pixeldust. When they see an advert for the Positron Project, then, it’s no surprise that they sign up. A nice house and a guaranteed job in the quaint, 1950s style town, Consilience? What’s not to love? Of course, every other month they have to go to Positron Prison whilst their ‘alternates’ (those who stay in the prison whilst they are out) live in their home, sleeping in their bed. Beats living in a car, that’s for sure. Of course, in typical Atwood style, all is not what it seems and that is where the fun begins.

This book is definitive Atwood. Or at least, it starts out that way. As a reader, you tumble into her dystopian vision and it’s great. The concept of Consilience and the project is fascinating and pulls you in straight away but as the story continues, the book almost flips into farce. It goes from dark and brooding to hysterically kitsch. It jumps from the deceptively quiet town of Consilience to the wilds of Las Vegas and whilst enjoyed my jaunt through Vegas with more than enough Elvises and Marilyns, filled as it was with humour and farcical action, it sort of tainted the beginning of the novel, which had promised an equally dark and brooding conclusion.

It seems to me that this book is a game of two halves and whilst both are enjoyable, they don’t seem to mesh tremendously well. Was it intended as black comedy throughout? Perhaps, though that wasn’t made clear at the outset. I can’t deny it made me giggle often (and out loud, too) but the ending almost made the beginning seem less than it was: less impressive, less serious, less of an issue. Only almost though, because actually, that stark warning we’ve come to love from dystopia, and that examination of our lives, is still evident, it’s still brooding, and it’s still a fascinating look at what we possibly have to look forward to. So what if the second half was funny? Who says that dystopia always needs to be depressing?

It doesn’t need to be depressing is the truth, and this novel shows that. It’s surprisingly light in tone for such an ominous dystopia, and surprisingly light for Atwood too. Perhaps she’d one too many sherries and was feeling giggly (disclaimer: I have absolutely no idea if Atwood drinks sherry, but for some reason, I sincerely hope she does). But do you know what? That makes it all the more special, that twist between the dark dystopia and the humorously human. And just to top it all off, there is also a bit of Atwood’s signature raunchiness – slightly peculiar and maybe even a little disturbing, but exciting all the same.

It’s an odd novel, this one. I raced through it (as I often do with Atwood), enjoying the way she makes the words dance on the page and thrilling in having a peek into her, dare I say? slightly twisted yet hugely impressive imagination. As a writer, she is an inspiration. As a reader, she is delectable. And whilst all the elements of this particular book didn’t quite mesh for me, it’s still a wonderful tale full of intrigue, menace, and just the right amount of humour.

As a serialised e-book, I read the first 3 episodes and thought it was a brilliant experiment with the form of the novel. Then the publisher Byliner suddenly went bust or something just when I was getting ready to read the fourth installment, which shares the title of this novel.

I got reacquainted with the main characters, Stan and Charmaine, with mixed feelings. They were not a particularly likeable pair, and as characters, they were so middle-of-the-road, they felt almost vanilla.

The story in the serial shows the couple already living in Positron, a socio-economic experiment at Positron, in an increasingly lawless and desolate America of the near future. The novel starts before, giving the reader more background, and arguably round out the characters a little more. It works a little for Charmaine, in whose head the voice of a Grandma Win speaks constantly, doling out pithy wisdom, and a chequered childhood that suggests Charmaine's blandness is not what it seems.

Positron boasts a twin-city kind of commune, where half the population stays in the gated community, Consilience, modelled after the good old-fashioned America of the 50s, while the other half, or their "alternates" go willingly to prison, and they rotate on a monthly basis. Both sets of civilians share living quarters in Consilience but never the two shall meet. This apparently solves overpopulation, unemployment, and other economic woes, while offering its citizens/inmates protection from the violence that rages in the shambolic society that's left to rot and fester outside its gates. Only things get a bit complicated when Stan finds a salacious note under his refrigerator on "changeover" day, and becomes obsessed with the kinky alternate he has dreamed into reality. What ensues is deceit and sexual betrayal that escalates to more sinister shenanigans as Stan and Charmaine find out more about the all-too-perfect community they have signed up permanently for.

Atwood is sure-handed in dealing with this dystopian world she has created, and it looks like she was having fun writing it, as the tone of this novel is much lighter than her previous speculative fiction. It is comic, and almost slapstick in some parts, (complete with Elvis and Marilyn impersonators, and 'prostibots'), mostly because the characters are caricaturish, perhaps to serve this function. However, given Atwood's track record, one can't help but feel that she has over-indulged in showing up the frivolity of human nature, to the extent that this novel threads a frighteningly thin line between satirical writing that show up frivolity on the one hand, and frivolous writing on the other.

Atwood came highly recommended by a good friend. I was impressed with some of her short stories. The Heart Goes Last, is the first of her novels I've read.

Pros:
Atwood has an ability to address fidelity, betrayal, oppression, fear, and a range of relationship struggles, within the context of the story. Unlike many modern novelists, she is able to bring attention to current and important topics and events, without focusing on them. She doesn’t give the appearance of endorsing or criticizing sociopolitical views. Of using the novel as a platform. She simply puts the human condition on paper, in the context of a solid story, and lets the reader respond, unencumbered by whatever her opinion might be.

Atwood seems to have a tendency to weave a lot of underlying humor into her writings. This novel was no different. Having listened to some of her interviews, I suspect this is the norm for most of her work.

Cons:
There are elements of character behavior in the story that would be far more plausible, had Atwood further dwelled in to the etiologies of the behaviors. Without developed reasons, some of the behaviors seemed ludicrous.

While the part sex and sexuality played in the story is relevant, general stereotypes are perpetuated relative to both gender and sexualized behaviors. While homosexuality and transgenderism are referred to, they aren’t really incorporated into the story, leaving the references meaningless and shallow. Lacking a real purpose in the story, they might’ve been better left out.

As stated in some other reviews, there is a strong focus on sex in the story. It left the story with a feeling of incompleteness, as if the focus on the fantasies, sex, sex robots, etc., came at the expense of a deeper character development. Sex became a central motivator at the expense of other real, human motives hardly touched on.

Summary:
Atwood’s craftsmanship as a writer is apparent in this novel, though compared to some of her short stories, I do not believe this novel does justice to her as an author. I do look forward to reading some of her other more popular works to get a broader view of her as a writer.

I would like to thank Doubleday Books & NetGalley for granting me a copy of this e-book to read in exchange for an honest review. Though I received this e-book for free that in no way impacts my review.

Goodreads Teaser: "Living in their car, surviving on tips, Charmaine and Stan are in a desperate state. So, when they see an advertisement for Consilience, a ‘social experiment’ offering stable jobs and a home of their own, they sign up immediately. All they have to do in return for suburban paradise is give up their freedom every second month – swapping their home for a prison cell. At first, all is well. But then, unknown to each other, Stan and Charmaine develop passionate obsessions with their ‘Alternates,’ the couple that occupy their house when they are in prison. Soon the pressures of conformity, mistrust, guilt and sexual desire begin to take over."

Margaret Atwood delivers another novel of deep interest and entertainment, which will leave the reader contemplating so many things long after they've put the book down. Stan and Charmaine are you're typical middle-class Americans. At least they used to be until everything fell apart. Watching how they each dealt with the daily pressure of finding themselves adrift in a world they no longer recognize is almost like staring into a mirror out of the corner of your eye. You can imagine yourself in their shoes and wonder how you'd be reacting to their situation.

I found Charmaine to be a slightly annoying ninny. She's constantly quoting her grandmother, and the quotes are all just ridiculous platitudes. She avoids anything dark or depressing, shoving all her bad memories into a place she never ventures. Her perpetually upbeat attitude in the face of extreme uncertainty annoyed me, and left me wondering about her husband Stan since he signed on for a life with this ray of blinding sunshine. Yet Stan was a more relatable character for me. He is more upfront and honest about his thoughts and feelings, even if only to himself. Yet sometimes he overloads and does lash out, which makes sense in the story and helped make him feel more realistic than Charmaine to me.

The pacing and arc of the story was smooth, attesting to Atwood's innate storytelling skills. While this book isn't as clearly dystopian as some of her other stories, it's heading that way, which makes it all the more frightening because what she created feels far to close to real for me. The messed up world she envisioned feels as if it's only a few steps away from where we stand now, and there are so many people ready to step in and create their own personal playground out of the entire world.

Although this tale reads as fiction, it certainly touches on highly charged current events, bringing things to light that engenders serious thought. Despite the fictional aspect of the story this is in many ways a very thought provoking novel, and one that will linger in my mind for some time to come. But then that has always been the case with books by the eminently talented Margaret Atwood.

The Heart Goes Last, Margaret Atwood, narrators, Cassandra Campbell, Mark Deakins
The premise of the book seems to be that the world has descended into a state of turmoil; all hell has broken loose on the ground with joblessness, poverty, starvation, and lawlessness growing in many cities. However, those who can afford to rise above the fray, actually do. They live in floating cells/pods, in their own self-contained fully functioning societies, and apparently, they are all now preoccupied with creative ways to satisfy their sexual needs, and to this end, the idea of robots servicing their needs is the next Silicon Valley get-rich idea, albeit, not in Silicon Valley.

A town called Concilience (combining the word convict with resilience) is created by the Positron Project. The establishment of this controlled community will supposedly eliminate civil disobedience and create a better world by providing full employment and equal opportunity. The deterioration of society in certain parts of the country will no longer be an issue with the growth of these cooperative environments. Everyone will be taken care of fairly. In these new communities, residents will spend half their time in the Positron prison and half their time in a luxurious home. An alternate family will share the home and prison cell every other month. Their lives will be completely controlled and all needs will be provided for them. They will be given jobs, one of the three choices they select, and although they will be at the mercy of the administrators for all decisions, there should be no reason to complain. There is one problematic codicil, once they sign on, they may never leave. The environment of the 1950’s was determined to be the most peaceful and comfortable and so everything in this created community is in that style right down to the music and clothing, food and television shows. It seems like a “Leave It To Beaver” perfect world combined with “Father Knows Best”.

In the end, however, some of those who had previously not been tempted to do anything wrong or immoral, were soon tempted to be unfaithful, and they broke the rules, possibly because of the ho hum, boring existence they were forced to endure day after day. In addition, greed somehow reared its ugly head, once again, with some wanting more than they were entitled to and more than they already had. Perhaps a natural consequence of being human is stretching the envelope and tempting fate. This old saying was also in evidence, “absolute power corrupts absolutely”.

In truth, although the imagination of Atwood was still feverishly at work, and she created an unusual narrative, infused with humor, albeit obsessed with a world that wanted nothing more than satisfying sex, it was disappointing. It did make me wonder, though, with all of the stress today, on sex enhancing drugs, and drugs that induce pleasure, are we not, perhaps, going in that direction? Perhaps Margaret Atwood is a visionary once again, as she was in “The Handmaid’s Tale”, with the idea of surrogate mothers. (I hope my remark is tongue in cheek and not a foretelling of the future.) I stuck with the book because of my respect for the author, but the plot seemed implausible and the sexual preoccupation seemed ridiculous. It was hard to take seriously, a woman who falls madly in love with a teddy bear in a medical procedure gone wrong, and Elvis impersonators as spies and vigilantes, simply did not capture my interest.

On the positive side, the character development was very detailed and the narrators were excellent, getting into the character’s heads and playing their roles well. Also, I did not realize that this was part of a series of books, and I did not read the first three, (“I’m Starved For You”, “Choke Collar” and “Erase Me”), so perhaps if I had, I would have had a different reaction.

I'm not a huge Atwood fan. That probably makes me a bit of an odd reviewer of this in some ways. As always with any Atwood I have read, it immediately grabs just a few pages in at most and then putters. Emotionally. Grim, bleak and threatening (this is not ALL Atwood novels I have read, just most), it seems almost too deliberate and flattens any suspense. It is like going into a teen horror movie and trying to pick which character to be emotionally invested in. Turning out, none being your best bet.

Atwood is a stellar writer. And this is how and why she is able to draw me in and cause such an affect right away. And she does that here. What is even more interesting is somehow I don't like Stan or Charmaine. I don't dislike them. But I just find them disquieting and Atwood somehow takes this bleeding heart and in a chapter makes Stan and Charmaine those "other people". People you immediately see as being much less fortunate. People in need but not needing. The people who might drop money in a hat or jar for but want to move on immediately.

Because what Atwood captures so vividly and yet in a quiet nuanced manner, is the deeply affecting sense that so many of us have. That misfortune is contagious. That it sucks in people who try to alleviate it. This is a myth. But it is so compelling and Atwood simply gets it here.

And in typical Atwood fashion there are moments that, while not laugh out loud funny, are still worth a silent chuckle and plenty of appreciation of the plausibly absurd. Her deft ability runs through the whole novel, if in a more than Atwood usual manner for the most part.

I did not enjoy this book. But I was entertained and it made me think a bit further past my usual boundaries. It was a book, so it didn't change my life or give me heavy deep thoughts to last me the rest of my days, mind you. But it engaged on many levels during my reading. Atwood is quite good at that. It also was a depressing and slightly laboring read plot wise. The characters do become ones I could empathize with and care for. But overall it was a very interesting take on a theme that has and probably will get a considerable fictional look.

Disclaimer: I received this free book from NetGalley.

I'd forgotten how Margaret Atwood books make me feel. Intellectually they are stimulating, rife with new ideas. They can also be a bit of a bummer. I'm a long time reader of her books, the first I read being The Handmaid's Tale. That book infuriated me. I found myself reading with bated breath. Anxious, angry and frustrated with the world I found myself immersed in. Her new novel The Heart Goes Last also left me with strong emotions. What a bummer of a book. Not because it was terribly sad, there are Elvis impersonators lightening things up for goodness sakes! This book is part social critique and part madcap prison escape. As I explained it to a friend, what is upsetting about the book is Atwood writes about a world we haven't seen yet, but is very very possible, and that's a scary thing. Her worlds are peopled with corporations, politicians, big money industries with one thing in mind, how best to screw over the normal people who suffer under them just trying to live their day to day lives. In an earlier novel, Oryx and Crake , vitamin companies set up a scheme which does double duty by introducing germs into their product. Well, the company is also a pharmaceutical company which can then treat that newly sick patient. What you've created for yourself is a never ending revenue stream. Lovely, how enterprising of them. You can see what we are dealing with here.

In The Heart Goes Last the economic climate has frozen over. There quite simply is no more money for the common people, the majority are homeless, unemployed and hopeless. Prisons have been set up by corporations in order to take advantage of people who are economically desperate. These people find themselves willing to give up all freedoms for the chance to live in a clean place, make a few dollars and feel a measure of self-respect again. At what cost? The couple at the center of this novel find out exactly how much the cost of their pursuit of happiness will be. They are constantly in danger from powerful people around them with more money, less morals and evil intentions. Her characters are very rarely good/evil. They are not all likeable, not every narrator is to be believed, nothing can be taken for granted.

What made me sad while reading this book is the realization that it is all just so possible. Which is the blessing and the curse of an Atwood book. You know going in, not only is it possible, but it is very probable. Atwood calls her books "speculative fiction". Not fantasy, or science fiction which gives it a decidedly "This would never happen." feel. She wants us to realize that these future possibilities are the trajectory we are currenlty on if allowed to continue unchecked. Thankfully we have voices like Atwood's to sound a warning. To remind us what can happen if we are not vigilant about where our society is going, as well as a reminder of what we are all capable of. Reading this novel requires thought and discernment. That's what I love about it.

Bonus link: Here's a Youtube video of a speech by Atwood about the concept of Speculative Fiction. Enjoy! [...]
Spotify Song for this book: Suspicious Minds - Elvis Presley

There's always something raw and beautiful about Atwood's prose but I've struggled with her more recent offerings.

Unfortunately her latest is no different.

We're sometime into the future - but not too far. It's a sordid world following some GFC of epic-proportions and once-happy couple Stan and Charmaine are now homeless, unemployed and living in their car. Until they're offered the chance at a Utopian future as part of the Positron Project in the gated-world of Consilience.

The Stepford Wives-type community is a world away from the nights spent in their car warding off potential thieves and they jump at the chance, knowing it means they'll never be allowed to leave.

Unsurprisingly all is not what it seems.

Although... I'm not exactly sure what it was; or what it was supposed to be. Ostensibly the community of Consilience was a money-maker for its investors though I kinda got lost in the how. Other than the manufacture of sex dolls and harvesting of body parts. And maybe baby's blood.

There are obviously underlying themes about not appreciating what we have, about willpower and vulnerability.

I was happy to play along for the most part but by the last third of the book struggled with what seemed to be huge plot holes. Extravagant plans were enacted involving our hapless duo which seemed unnecessary and OTT. And ultimately.... made no sense. (I kept thinking of the Michael Douglas movie, The Game!)

jI never really warned to Charmaine and Stan and the orbiting characters inside and outside of them seemed unrealistic and excessive.

I wondered if the whole thing was going to be some huge metaphor (which I AGAIN didn't get) and as usual I was taking things too literally wondering 'how' some characters travelled inside to outside; and struggled with the lack of inconsistency of the dire circumstances of the world outside (Las Vegas seemed untouched, for eg).

Plus I got really confused during the Elvis sex doll bit.

So... lots of potential. Beautifully written, but it just didn't work for me.

Desperate times call for desperate measures. How much would you give up to have the basic necessities of life? Would you give up your freedom?

This book brings to life the desperation of two people who have lost everything. They are living in their car and barely surviving. They are the embodiment of what's happened to what was once the middle class.

There is no middle class now. Just a whole lot of criminals. This is what happens when an unstable system collapses.

But, we need solutions to these problems right? People need jobs. Laws have to be upheld. For profit prison type compounds are the answer here. You go in, but you can never come out. Ever.

Stan and Charmaine sign away their rights. Sign away their freedom. They do this because they feel they have no other choice. Sure they can go back to the outside. Sure they will have freedom there. Freedom to be attacked and robbed and killed. Freedom to starve. Freedom to be homeless. When someone is offering you a home, food, clothing and a job.....why not take it? At this point, what do they have to lose?

All they have to do is work and rotate in and out of prisons. Or at least that's what they're told. They aren't told about the organ harvesting. They aren't told about the baby blood collection and sales. They aren't told about the mind zapping of human beings to be turned into living sex robots.

This book gives a chilling look into just how far we as a species can fall. It shows just how much we will give up to survive. It also shows how far people with power will go when they are unchecked.

It's not unrealistic either. Stop and think about it.

I enjoyed reading this book. The characters have such depth. There is nothing held back. No thought unspoken. No fantasy apologetically sugared over. Its a look into how our minds work without the filter we put our words through before they hit our mouth.

This author is brilliant.

Check out my full review on https://alliesopinions.wordpress.com/2015/10/12/book-review-for-the-heart-goes-last-by-margaret-atwood/

The Heart Goes Last is both playful and subversive. It is satirical and allegorical. The story it tells can’t be taken seriously, but its targeting of people who behave like sheep, sacrificing freedom for comfort, of men who find new ways to oppress women, and of corporations that place profits ahead of … well, everything … is well taken. Margaret Atwood doesn’t beat the reader over the head with lectures about morality, but the background themes are never far from the reader’s thoughts.

The economy has tanked. Stan and Charmaine are living in a car. The rich are living offshore on tax-free floating platforms. Stan’s life is tied down by “tiny threads of petty cares and small concerns.” Joining his brother Conner in the criminal underclass may be Stan’s only hope. Charmaine, who works for tips in a bar, is tempted to turn tricks until she sees an even more tempting ad for the Positron Project.

Against Conner’s advice, Stan and Charmaine join the corporate/social experiment called Consilience/Positron. The experiment involves voluntary imprisonment in exchange for full employment. In alternating months, residents of the prison (Positron) swap places with residents of the village (Consilience), but even in the village they have no freedom, in that they are cut off from the outside world. They see only the news, television shows, and movies that are chosen for them. They work at the jobs the project gives them. They own what the project allows them to own. The project demands meek obedience to its rules; disruption has harsh consequences.

Against this background, the story begins to explore the relationship between Stan and Charmaine, their inability to connect with each other and their consequent misunderstanding about who the other person is and what the other person wants. As the plot moves forward, the characters must decide whether they are loyal to each other, to themselves, or to Consilience. Another plot thread compares complex relationships between humans to simpler interactions between humans and robots (or, more precisely, sexbots). Of course, some human relationships seem robotic, which is one of the points that Atwood’s novel makes.

The Heart Goes Last combines a serious story about the breakdown of society with satirical commentaries on the cozy relationship between government and big business, the not-so-cozy relationship that is often defined by marriage, and the exploitation of the powerless by the powerful (particularly, but not exclusively, the exploitation of women by men). It also makes the point that there will always be people who are willing to give up freedom, independence, and any ability they might possess to think for themselves in exchange for comfort and security. After all, life is just easier when other people make decisions for you. Of course, for every bit of freedom you choose to relinquish, the people in control will want you to give up just a bit more. Utopia comes at a price.

The Heart Goes Last stitches together a number of novellas that Atwood previously published in what science fiction writers of the 1940s and 1950s called a “fix-up” novel. It reads well, but the fixed-up nature of the work is apparent in some of the sharp turns the novel takes. Atwood takes the story a bit over the top with all the varieties of evil she concocts, but that’s the nature of satire, and when greed is being satirized, going over the top is forgivable. Some of the humor might be a little too easy (although making fun of Elvis impersonators never gets old) and the story provokes more smiles than outright laughter. Still, this is a fun book. If I could, I would give The Heart Goes Last 4 1/2 stars.

The Heart Goes Last by Margaret Atwood is very highly recommended, brilliant surrealistic dystopian novel which will likely be banned somewhere in the future for any number of hot topics it contains. I can't help but think that the release was purposefully planned to be during this week, banned book week.

Charmaine and Stan are a young couple who have lost their jobs and their house. They are lucky they have a car to live in and escape from those who aren't so fortunate and might have larceny or worse on their minds. Charmaine is working as a bartender to make a little money for the two. When Charlene sees an ad by Positron for Consilience, a city with jobs and security, she and Stan decide to check it out. The deal is it is a closed system and you sign up for life.

The set up for Consilience/Positron is based on a contained population/workforce that shares prison/town duties. "Medium-size towns with large penitentiaries could maintain themselves, and the people inside such towns could live in middle-class comfort. And if every citizen were either a guard or a prisoner, the result would be full employment: half would be prisoners, the other half would be engaged in the business of tending the prisoners in some way or other. Or tending those who tended them. And since it was unrealistic to expect certified criminality from 50 percent of the population, the fair thing would be for everyone to take turns: one month in, one month out. Think of the savings, with every dwelling serving two sets of residents! It was time-share taken to its logical conclusion. Hence the twin town of Consilience/Positron."

There is no homelessness, everyone is employed, and the profits go to keeping the system running and everyone happy. Charmaine and Stan are satisfied, for a while, but soon they seem to be feeling some discontent with their carefully planned lives, especially when they become obsessed with the couple who live in their house on alternate months. Their separate sexual involvement with this couple sets them up as pawns to be involved in a complex scheme.

Atwood's writing is astute, exceptional, and clever. The story is innovative and absurd. Above all else, The Heart Goes Last is entertaining, even as it incorporates and questions many societal controversies in the plot. And I am talking about the kind of controversies that keep talk shows on the air and set blogs burning. There is adult language and sex, which seems to bother many, but perceptive readers are going to see the social commentary underneath the farce-like situations and satire.

My review copy was courtesy of Knopf Doubleday for review purposes.

Once again Margaret Atwood has proven herself to be a master in the art of storytelling. The Heart Goes Last pulled me in immediately with its quick-paced plot and a dystopian America.

The Heart Goes Last features couple Stan and Charmaine as the protagonists. In the tale's beginning, the couple is living dangerously in their car in a now-dangerous world.

Threatened constantly by robbery, rape, and murder, Stan and Charmaine ultimately opt to join the Positron Project, an experimental society excluded from the outside world.

Seemingly too good to be true, with its focus on creating "maximum possible happiness" for residents, Stan is at first skeptical, but gives in to Charmaine's desire for safety from outside the "twin city" of Positron/Consilience.

Residents of Positron/Consilience alternate monthly between the two cities. While in Positron, men and women are separated into wings and reside in prison cells. On the other hand, in Consilience, residents are divided by relation and live together in homes, which are occupied by "alternates" while one of the couples is in Positron for the month.

Illicit romance plays a large role in the story, as do the questions of morality and ethics. The moment I discovered the true meaning of the book's title, a chill went down my spine.

I highly recommend The Heart Goes Last to all fans of Margaret Atwood as well as to readers who enjoy dystopian, futuristic, fictional worlds.

Never did I think I would laugh all the way through a Margaret Atwood book. The internal dialogue of the two hapless main characters was so wry and so funny that I wish the book went on for longer just to listen in to them further. Yes, as other reviewers pointed out, there is lots of swearing particularly on the part of Stan, but it was so true to his character and made what was going on in his head so funny. By the same token, the fact that these terrible things would crop up in Charmaine's life and the strongest reaction she could muster was a "gosh darn it" was equally as entertaining. Atwood has written a very humorous dystopian tale and the characters are spot on. Who but Margaret Atwood has the literary chops to pull this off? Don't get caught up with what you think Atwood stores should be like and enjoy this for its insight, moral spotlight and loads of very funny dialog. I enjoyed every page.

3.5 Stars

I have always loved Margaret Atwood’s writing. When I read some of her earlier work in high school, it opened me up to some really unique ideas that my small town self hadn’t really considered before. I’ve always found her writing complex and thorough, not necessarily light, but always enriching. I was happy to learn that The Heart Goes Last was unique in its own right, but fit right in along Atwood’s previously enjoyed works.

I didn’t know much about this going in, but within the first few chapters, I was totally captured by the concept. I thought it was just such a unique situation to really put the character of these characters to the test and I was really eager to see where things would go and how these people would react. I also really loved how one person’s secrets influenced the other’s reality without either of them knowing. It was just so clever!

I was a bit annoyed with Stan in the beginning of the book, though. He sets his hyperfocus on his alternate, Jasmine, and concocts a brilliant plan to run into her on Switchday. His words are very stalker-y, very rape-y, and they did not sit well with me at all! But to my surprise, it was Charmaine that I ended up being super annoyed with in the end. I really didn’t like her character at all. So gullible, so naively trusting. She had no backbone and was just a mouldable pawn in everyone else’s game.

As a whole, The Heart Goes Last was littered with dystopian warnings; Atwood does what she does best by building a story that stands beyond being just a story. It’s not really about what is happening to the characters, but more what these characters witness in the change of their society. What they are coerced to do for overall survival and what others do when driven by greed and power and possession. It’s actually a very scary book, along the lines of Brave New World or 1984, where governing authorities try to pull a utopian veil over the dark dictatorship they’ve created.

I actually didn’t like the ending much though, if I’m being honest here. Or really, the whole second part of the book. I liked how it all came together and how all the actions were putting a bigger plan into play, but the very end of it, I just didn’t like what is presented. It was almost like the tone of all of this shifted, that scary governmental plot of our future turned into kind of an oversexed mockery of society. On its own maybe that would have been fine, but I got a significantly different feel in the start – and maybe by my own mistake, I get a more serious sense from Atwood as a writer by principal – and the direction this ended up going in just kind of fell flat for me in the end.

I was hoping for a big climactic stick-it-to-the-government ending, but that was just kind of overshadowed by sexbots and imprinting and then once everything was exposed, it was like everyone was fine with it and everything went back to normal in a society that had been in shambles at the very start. That just didn’t make sense to me and was a bit of a letdown.

Originally posted on citygirlscapes.com

I’m a little unclear on the details, but from what I understand, this book began as several short stories by Atwood that have been re-edited and are going to be published together in one volume in September. I have not read any of the short stories, so I cannot comment on those, but this comprehensive volume was an overall enjoyable read. I’m a little embarrassed to admit that this is my first time reading anything by Margaret Atwood. The Handmaid’s Tale has been on my “To be Read” list for ages now, but I just haven’t gotten around to it.

After a catastrophic financial collapse leaves a significant percentage of Americans without jobs, Charmaine and Stan are forced to leave their home and live in their car. They get by with the small income that Charmaine makes from her bartending job, but with crime at an all time high they are never really safe. With nowhere to go and no better prospects, the young married couple is stuck in a seemingly never ending cycle of “just getting by”. But when the pair hears of Consilience, a safe and comfortable place to live and work, it seems like an opportunity that they cannot pass up. Never mind the fact that they have to voluntarily report to prison every other month while they live in this otherwise idyllic community. The two quickly sign up to join the community, and you may be able to guess, it really is too good to be true.

As much as I love a good dystopian, I have been steering away from the genre lately. What can be done that hasn’t been done before? I didn’t feel that The Heart Goes Last was ground-breaking or anything, but it did feel very unique. My biggest problem with this book were Charmaine and Stan. They were both so deeply unlikable, and I really couldn’t ever get past that.

Disclosure: I received a free copy of this book through Netgalley.

That The Heart Goes Last is the first title I have read by Margaret Atwood places me, I suspect, at a bit of a disadvantage when it comes to discussing the novel’s merits and faults. I cannot compare it to the fourteen Margaret Atwood novels that preceded it so I do not know with any certainty just how different it may be from her usual fare. I do know that Atwood is no stranger to dystopian related plotlines, so The Heart Goes Last probably comes as no big shock to her more experienced readers. What makes this one a bit different from the usual novel is that it began life as a serialization project of Atwood’s that only later came together as the novel it is. That is not necessarily a bad thing, but it may explain the somewhat tenuous connection between the tone of the book’s early chapters and the tone of its later ones.

The Heart Goes Last opens in a strange new United States, a country whose economic system has so completely collapsed that people consider themselves lucky to have even an old car to find shelter within. Stan and Charmaine, a married couple, are doing exactly that while Stan desperately searches for work and Charmaine brings home a few dollars every day from her dead end job. They are fast running out of money, though, and it is becoming more and more difficult to find a place safe enough to park their car for even a few hours rest because, as little as they have, others want to take it from them.

So when Stan and Charmaine hear that a neighboring town called Consilience is running something called The Positron Project, they eagerly apply for acceptance into the program. And why wouldn’t they? There is a comfortable, clean house for everyone in Consilience and, more importantly, the unemployment rate is zero. Everyone has a job, a warm place to sleep, and plenty of nourishing food. What could be the catch? Well hang on a second.

But even when told that the home and jobs will be theirs only on alternating months of the year, and that when not living in the home they will be prisoners inside Positron Prison, Stan and Charmaine jump at the deal. After all, one month a prisoner, one month a prison administrator, really doesn’t sound that bad to two people in constant danger of being killed in their sleep.

This is the premise of The Heart Goes Last and, as the novel begins, Atwood presents it all in a very serious manner. But about midway through, her story is consumed by infidelity, rather kinky sex that includes lifelike robots to fulfill every sexual fantasy imaginable (think Elvis and Marilyn), and near farcical escapes from the prison. While it is all very amusing and entertaining (as I will be the first to admit), I find myself wishing that Atwood had maintained throughout the novel the more serious tone with which she began it. The result would, I think, have been a much more satisfying novel than the comic satire this one morphed into.

Originally posted on: http://www.peekingbetweenthepages.com/2015/10/the-heart-goes-last-by-margaret-atwood-audiobook.html

In a Nutshell

Margaret Atwood’s latest The Heart Goes Last is Atwood’s classic dystopian with a little added craziness. I really enjoy Atwood’s writing and always find it interesting to read about her dark dystopian worlds. Apparently this novel is the reworking of a serial where the first four books came out in sections. I hadn’t heard of them before but was very excited to read them all in full. As always when you enter the dystopian world that Atwood creates you are in a for a ride.

Audio Thoughts

The Heart Goes Last is narrated by Cassandra Campbell and Mark Deakins and they were great. Cassandra Campbell is at the top of my list of favorite narrators and while I hadn’t listened to Mark Deakins before I found his voice very pleasant to listen to. Between the two of them they portrayed all of the various characters perfectly making this a very exciting listening experience for me.

Reflections

Society is in a shambles – there are no jobs, people are going hungry, and violence is rampant. Stan and Charmaine have been living in their car and just getting through each day is a struggle. Then they spot an advertisement for a place called Consilience that promises food, a job, and a home all for the small price of having to go to prison every other month. Both Stan and Charmaine think it’s too good a deal to pass up considering they are all out of any other options for survival. Consilience seems to be everything they thought it would be and they settle into a life there. Soon enough though their thoughts of a perfect life begin to crumble as they both begin to secretly become obsessed with the alternate couple that lives in their home when they are in the prison. This leads them both into a world where nobody can be trusted and so much borders on a very strange reality.

Love it, Like it…Or not…

I liked it a lot especially on audio although I think I would have liked this one in print as well. However with Cassandra Campbell as one of the narrators the audio is hard to pass up and of course it’s so well done. For me it’s the imagination of Atwood that amazes me. So much of this novel is quite bizarre but that was part of the attraction for me and what kept me listening. I think that’s whats important when reading this book – you do need to suspend belief for a some of it and you know what that’s ok. That to me is what reading is all about. As a note to my readers – there is sexual content in this novel that may not appeal to all. Recommended for those who enjoy dystopian fiction ,with what I would say, is an added twist or two. I really enjoyed it!

Ehhhh this book. I feel like it deserved three stars, but GoodReads counts three stars as "I liked it", which is a bit of exaggeration. The Heart Goes Last was an okay book but definitely not as good as I expected based off the love I had for Margaret Atwood's MaddAddam trilogy, which was to die for.

I really liked the first bit of the book when Charmaine and Stan were living in a car together, especially because my future is so sketchy right now I don't know where I will be living in a few months. So maybe I should pick up a non-fiction about living in a vehicle. But I digress.

The next sixty or so percent of the book essentially bored me to tears, which flecks of interesting bits would pop up but not enough to keep me from wondering if I should just set the book aside and call it a day. But I kept plowing through it for a very exciting and fast paced wrap up of the book, but still overall disappointing.

THIS IS A SPOILER:
I was disgusted over what happened to Charmaine at the end of the story where her mind was fudged with in order for her to love Stan and basically become his love slave. I can't figure out if I was even more disgusted or relieved to find out that it didn't actually happen and Charmaine was just fooling herself.

This was fascinating!

Narrated By Cassandra Campbell, Mark Deakin, who did an absolutely amazing job. I was glad that there were two narrators. There are many characters in this and having just one narrator it can get difficult to differentiate between voices. These two did a marvelous job and kept the story going.

The story starts in a dystopian type time for Charmain and her husband, Stan. Neither really have any work and they are desperate to find something, anything, to keep them going. They are living in their car and although Charmain tries to remain positive, it gets difficult at times. After Stan has a run in with his brother and thinks that his brother may try to get Charmain to have sex with him, Stan decides enough is enough. He will do anything. That’s when they hear about Positron.

The story from the get go is intense. There is a grittiness to it, an edge that really makes it stand out. It was like watching a horror movie. I knew that at any moment something was going to happen to these two.

And then, the plot starts to cool a bit. Like taking a deep breath before plunging into icy waters. The main thing about being in Positron is that you have to live one month in an enclosed community and then another month in prison, alternating as long as you are there.

Stan and Charmain wind up being at Positron for a while (I want to say a year) and are starting to really feel in a rut. They remember what it was like outside so they do not complain, but they are also in a rut in their relationship. It’s this rut that causes some major issues. Both Charmain and Stan start to seek other ways of relieving their tensions and this starts the snowball of chaos.

The longer the plot goes on the more silly it gets. There are some things at the end of the book that are just straight out ridiculous. But, I loved the way it ended. There’s a twist and then a twist to THAT twist. I really enjoy that this feels settled but maybe not quite. You may need to suspend belief to be able to enjoy all of this as the plot delves into strange categories. It is Sci Fi and I enjoyed it, even the twisted parts.

The audio was very appealing and had me on the edge of my seat. To reiterate, absolutely fantastic narration.

Received from author, through audiobookreviewer.com, in exchange for an honest review.

<b>My original <a href="http://audiobookreviewer.com/reviews/heart-goes-last-novel-margaret-atwood/">The Heart Goes Last</a> audiobook review and many others can be found at <a href="http://audiobookreviewer.com">Audiobook Reviewer</a>.</b>

To say that Margaret Atwood’s newest novel is highly anticipated, is the understatement of the century. The Heart Goes Last is Margaret Atwood’s first stand-alone book in over 10 years. Her last one, The Blind Assassin won the 2000 Man Booker Prize. The novel is a reworking of the Positron ebook series: a series of 4 short stories that were released exclusively as ebooks. If you loved The Handmaids Tale and Oryx and Crake, you will probably love this book too.

In a society filled with poverty, violence, and unemployment, married couple Charmaine and Stan are living in their car and barely surviving from day to day. When they see an advertisement for the Consilience project, it seems like a no-brainer to sign up. Consilience offers a guarantee of stable employment and home ownership for the small price of a loss of freedom every other month. As part of the project they must agree to alternate every month between their home and the Positron prison. At first, Consilience seems like a paradise but as the months progress, cracks start to appear in Charmaine and Stan’s relationship and there are indications that all is not what it appears to be in this idyllic suburban paradise.

With wit, dark humor, intelligence, and imagination, Margaret Atwood brings us yet another terrifying look at a bleak future. The Heart Goes Last was a lot of fun. I hadn’t read the ebook stories so the plot was new to me and I was on the edge of my seat throughout the entire book. I loved both The Handmaid’s Tale and Oryx and Crake and this book felt like a blend of those two books in terms of atmosphere and some of the underlying themes. One thing I love about Atwood’s style is that she constructs sentences in a very straightforward and unpretentious way but the ideas underlying her stories are complex and intelligent. This book was no exception. It reads like commercial fiction but has themes and ideas more reminiscent of literary fiction. As a result, many readers will be able to enjoy this book on multiple levels. It is an engaging and fast-paced read and it raises some scary possibilities.

My only criticism was that I found the choice of jail as the alternative to be an odd one that Atwood never really addressed or justified. Why would a solution to societal problems and poverty be to put non-violent, non-criminals in jail? Why not dormitories or more controlled communes? It felt like an odd decision and while reading, I found myself thinking, why would anyone agree to alternate with a month in jail if they haven’t committed any crime? That said, there were many bizarre occurrences throughout the story and part of the fun was being carried along in the wacky plot line. It didn’t stop me from thoroughly enjoying the reading experience but I did bump it down by a star as a result of this nagging question.

Who will like this book? It’s a dystopian novel with some dark humor, sexual content (consensual and non-consensual), and some quirky and bizarre occurrences. I found the situations in this book a little more “out there” than some of her previous books (Elvis & Marilyn sexbots, headless chickens, organ harvesting, etc) but it worked for me. If you like dystopian novels and can suspend some disbelief in the weirder elements, you will enjoy this novel.

The country is in a deep depression and Stan and Charmaine have been forced to live in their car, a dangerous situation that offers them little sleep as they are forced to constantly move the car from place to place to avoid gangs who want to steal the car and who knows what else. Charmaine earns a little money working as a waitress. One day at work, she sees an ad for the Positron Project in the community of Consilience. Residents of the community agree to spend their time alternating between their picture perfect home the Project provides for them and a non-violent prison, switching every month. Consilience = Cons + Resilience. What could possibly go wrong? It turns out a lot. Predictably, the Positron Project is not what it seems on the surface.

Every resident has a job both inside and outside of the prison. Stan works in a scooter repair shop in the community and as a chicken farmer inside the prison. Charmaine works in the community bakery on the outside and as Medication Administrator in the prison. Charmaine is so sweet and naive that the bad things she does both in both places were really surprising to me. Yet, I still liked her and even felt sorry for her. Stan, on the other hand, just rubbed me the wrong way even though truly he was mostly the victim in this story.

The atmosphere in this book is a cross between an Orwell novel and The Stepford Wives (which happens to be one of my all-time favorite books). Of course, being an Atwood novel, it reminded me somewhat of The Handmaid’s Tale but in atmosphere only. The Heart Goes On is definitely original and not a repeat of the Handmaid’s Tale. There is more dark humor and I love dark humor when it’s done right.

The last bit of the book involving Elvis impersonators – yes, Elvis impersonators – went a little off the rails for me and is what kept me from giving this book five stars. However, the very ending of the book stunned me. It was the kind of ending that left me thinking about the book for days afterward. This book would make an excellent book club selection for that reason.

I’m a huge Atwood fan and this book did not disappoint.

{I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.}

It's not very often you run across a dystopian novel where only a portion of the population is affected by a catastrophic event. How about one where a financial crisis forced a large portion of the population, but not everyone, out of work? They cannot find work and are forced to spend their days and nights on the streets, evading roaming gangs. It's no surprise that these folks are looking for an escape. A mysterious social project where they agree to go in and never come out is a promising option.

That's the premise of The Heart Goes Last by Margaret Atwood (her most famous work is The Handmaid's Tale). This premise was so promising that I could not wait to see where it ended up. Sadly, I barely made it to the end of this novel and skimmed the last 20 percent. Let me explain.

Here are things I do no like in novels that were prominently featured in The Heart Goes Last:

-Twisted, vengeful, rage-filled sex as a main theme.
-Tiresome obsessive behavior that goes on for pages and pages and pages.
-Innumerable references to sex with animals and inanimate objects that features into major plot points.
-Little to no redeeming qualities in characters who I want to like, but just can't bring myself to like.
-A serial adapted into a novel that has the feeling of a serial, not a novel.

So, yeah, that pretty much sums it up. Unfortunately, no matter how talented Atwood is as a writer, the subject matter was simply not for me.

Find more reviews at www.plantohappy.com.

I've always been a fan of Margaret Atwood since reading The Handmaids Tale ages ago. So I was completely thrilled to get an advanced copy of her newest book. It had a dystopian feel to it and that was just icing on the cake so to speak. The book is set in a post financial ruined country and Stan and Charmaine are struggling to make ends meet and living out of their car. Charmaine dreams of a better life and Stan is frustrated that he can't find work to support them. Charmaine sees a commercial one day at work for people to sign up for a new start on life and she is convinced this is the chance they've been looking for. Stan's brother Conor says that it's a trap and they shouldn't believe anything they've heard. Unwilling to take his advice they sign up and everything seems amazing. A new house, work, food to eat and things to buy. The fact that they have to alternate months in their home with a month in a prison seems a small price to pay for there security and happiness. But things are not always what they seem of course and Stan becomes obsessed with thoughts of the other couple who lives in their house when they are at the prison and Charmaine starts a tumultuous affair with the husband of the couple who lives in their house. The leader of this community, Ed, has sinister plans in the works for organ harvesting, sex bots, and rejuvination for the elderly which may come at a huge price to Charmaine and Stan. An outstanding book!

In Atwood’s latest speculative fiction effort, capitalism is more ruthless than ever and the middle-class is all but a memory, with economic woes the order of the day.

So, Charmaine and Stan, young marrieds, once employed with a house and a future, find themselves turned out, subsisting on scraps and day labor, living in their car, fearful of roving gangs and loner criminals. Then opportunity presents itself in the form of an economic and social experiment. Live in a lovely town, reminiscent of the 1950s for a month, serve a month in prison, repeat. The idea is that prison will make you more appreciative of your free and prosperous life; you’ll not take it for granted. The catch? Once you sign on, you sign on for life and can never leave the community. Given the hardship Charmaine and Stan have suffered, it sounds like a pretty good deal. Except that boredom and temptation rear up, a long with the suspicion that not all is as it first appeared.

Atwood addresses a variety of social, environmental, and economic issues in The Heart Goes Last: A Novel, as well as weakness shared by most of us humans, among them infidelity, moral compromise, even authorized murder. Herein, she softens things with large dollops of humor and absurdity: robotic Elvis escorts, Green Man troupes, humans altered to love you forever, anyone?

Not Atwood’s strongest work, not when compared to The Handmaid's Tale, or the MADDADDAM TRILOGY BOX: Oryx & Crake; The Year of the Flood; Maddaddam. However, you’ll find it thoughtful and thoroughly entertaining. As Mary Poppins sang, “Spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down/The medicine go down/The medicine go down/Just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down/In a most delightful way.”

In Margaret Atwood’s upcoming novel The Heart Goes Last, readers are introduced to married couple Charmaine and Stan as they endure a dramatic shift in their lifestyle after an economic crash takes their jobs and money. They start off the book living inside of their run-down car and with their only income stemming from tips from Charmaine’s gig as a bartender. They feel desperate and miserable, to say the least, and jump at the chance to take part in a social experiment called Consilience that offers stable job and housing.

The only condition to this seemingly perfect opportunity is that they have to swap out their fancy new homes for prison cells every other month. This way, society is regulated and the Consilience leaders will be able to morph the downtrodden country into a utopia, of sorts.

Everything seems flawless, but when Charmaine and Stan become sexually obsessed with their alternates, the people who live in their homes in the months they’re spending in prison, the bright and shiny exterior of Consilience begins to fade and they begin to question free-will, conformity, and perfection.

I enjoyed this book for the most part– it was such a unique concept and truly kept my attention for the majority of the book. However, the sections of the book seemed quite disjointed– something that makes sense when you consider the fact that The Heart Goes Last was originally published in segments online. Naturally, when you put all of those pieces together, you don’t get a natural flowing book. At many points in time, I found myself very confused about how the plot would continue on before the storyline took a confusing turn.

Aside from this major downturn of the book, I am completely in awe of the world and characters Atwood created. The descriptions of each completely took me into Consilience– I felt like I could see the lockers and streets and prisons. I felt like I was watching Charmaine and Stan as a fly-on-the-wall. I cannot say enough good things about these aspects!

Note: I received an ARC of this book from the publisher to review.

A quirky, near future, love story, with organ harvesting, sex robots and singing Elvis impersonators (oh my!). Margaret Atwood delivers true to her form in this humorous tale of Stan and Charmaine, an unemployed couple living out of their car and looking desperately to regain their grip on the middle class dream they once held. A story that, while fiction, touches on the real and relatable themes of heartbreak, trust, temptation and corporate greed, to name a few.

The characters of Stan and Charmaine are well written and very relatable. All they want is to better their situation but the opportunities they seize lead to predicaments that test them, and they flounder. Ultimately they become pawns in a scheme that puts their love for each other in question. Fun, engaging and unpredictable, Ms. Atwood has produced once again an excellent work of escapism. A fun read and worth your time

This was my first book by Margaret Atwood, yes I know where have I been? It's not because I was trying not to. I just hadn't had the chance so far. I will say that this one was definitely a different kind of book. Not sure if this is an usual kind for her or not. But, in the whole realm of reading, it was a different kind of reading.

I very much enjoyed reading the book and it definitely kept me interested. There were some definitely far out things going on in this story. I never did understand why they lived in regular housing for one month and then a prison cell for another month and then start the trend all over again. That was kind of strange. However, I guess it kept life from becoming monotonous. Also, I'm not sure I would like to share my house every other month with someone else either. But, it sure beat living in a car. I couldn't imagine that.

There were some pretty creepy characters in this story. Some of them felt almost too robotic as if they felt no emotion or had no feelings. But the main characters felt and acted human.

There was some mention of sex in here, but it wasn't that bad and it was referred to several times, but it wasn't like in the romance books or anything so I don't think it would be enough to put people off.

I thought that while the story was strange, it was very enjoyable and I would definitely recommend it especially if your into dystopian novels.

Thanks Doubleday Books and Net Galley for providing me with this free e-galley in exchange for an honest review.

I love dystopian books and Margaret Atwood is the queen. She has a way with a story that makes you distrust everything. I love a book that completely changes my way of thinking like this one has. Margaret Atwood's stories are instant classics on the same level as George Orwell and Ray Bradbury. I've said it before, but if you haven't read The Handmaid's Tale yet, it should be on your list.

This book is no exception. It's so intricate and twisty, I'm struggling to explain to you how awesomely complicated it is without ruining anything when you read it. In a terrible world where everything has fallen apart, the best option for Charmaine and Stan is to join an experimental program in Consilience. For 30 days, they will live in luxury with a beautiful house and good jobs. Then, for the next 30 days, they will spend in prison while their 'alternates' live in their house and work their jobs. In this way, 2 sets of people can live one life. That's where things get messy.

Around every turn in this book there's a new surprise and each one is darker and more disturbing than the last. This book isn't for the faint of heart. However, if you are willing to delve into its depths, the story is more than worth it. It's an engaging and all encompassing book that was also very easy to read. Don't be surprised it if challenges some preconceived notions that you have about sexuality and human nature.

What do an extramarital affair, prison, mind control, sex bots and Elvis have in common? This book.

WELL. That was one hell of a ride. I haven't read a book that grabs you by the throat and demands to be read in a long time. And this is only the 2nd book of Mrs. Atwood's that I've read (The Handmaid's Tale being the other). Though I also loved "Handmaid," I'd have to say that "The Heart Goes Last" is better if only because the story itself is so complex, and full of twists and turns. This is the book that kept me up late last night because there's a point where it physically becomes impossible to put down. The gist of the story is this. Stan and Charmaine are a married couple living out of their car, and broke in some dystopian future America where a massive depression has caused millions of people to lose their jobs and homes. One day Charmaine sees an ad for Consilience, and a chance at a normal life again. In Consilience, they share their home with another couple and they alternate spending one month in prison for one month "outside" with jobs and food. Of course you know what they say about a deal too good to be true....

You know how in novels we generally get to follow the heroic ones? And by extension to imagine ourselves in that position, being heroic?Atwood turns that on its head in this satire. Charmaine just wants everything to be clean and nice. Stan wants things to work out, for once. They want life to be simple. Like most of us.

At the beginning of the novel they’re living out of their car, having lost their jobs and their home after yet another financial crisis. Life is bleak and frightening, but they are offered a chance of escape. A prison has long been seen as the saviour of a deprived community, bringing with it secure and well-paid jobs. Consilience is an innovation. If prisons needs communities and communities need prisons, why not have a place where people are both? One month inmate, the next citizen. The only catch, they have to sign up for life, and once in, there is no way out.

In Consilience, Stan and Charmaine get to live every other month in a pastel, idealized, 1950s kind of a world, drenched in the positive thinking of modern corporate life (‘Shout out for the Brussels Sprouts team!’). Stan and Charmaine are safe and well fed and happy to play by the rules. And yet –

This book is bright and fast and funny but behind the humour it’s bursting with ideas. And that title. What a great title.

I think that if I had read this book in paper instead of audio, I wouldn’t have known what to make of it. The Heart Goes Last is more satirical and farcical than Atwood’s other dystopian books. But the narrators nailed it. Cassandra Campbell, who voiced Charmaine, was absolutely perfect, capturing the a character who is like a child, naive and prone to believing in fantasies but that picks up on more than people give her credit for. I don’t think I would really have gotten the character as Atwood intended if I hadn’t heard Campbell’s interpretation. Stan, voiced by Mark Deakins, is more easily relatable and Deakins does a great job of believably exposing his flaws. Plus a couple of times I thought I was listening to a toned down Nathan Fillion and that is always happy times. I couldn’t believe that this Atwood novel came out last year without me hearing a peep about it, I guess because many people didn’t like it. Probably thought it was too far off her normal tone. But I particularly enjoyed it paired with the dive into the industrial prison complex, the nature of sexuality vs lust, the examination of whether safety and security are worth trading in free-will, all written with an obvious smile on Atwood’s face. I get vicariously gleeful when reading a work that the author obviously had such a blast writing.

Definitely worth another couple of rereads and a good discussion about over hot beverages.

Atwood never disappoints with her ability to tell a story with clarity, integrity and slow suspense. Not to imply that this is a thriller- rather, it takes place in a futuristic setting in which a tale unfolds that is somewhat horrifying because it is blatantly feasible as a possible outcome of today's society. Morals have weakened, and the American Dream is just a memory, but the remnants of what a married couple wants for emotional and financial security carries this tale through a compelling series of events. Atwood also gives us subtle comic relief with some of her characters and I found this to be a more fulfilling tale than some of her most recent works. Overall, I strongly recommend this book.

I'm a Margaret Atwood fan. This book pulled me in immediately and was so incredibly good that I was telling friends they absolutely had to read it. I couldn't put it down. Then, about two-thirds or less into the book, it became a farce. I wish Atwood had stayed with the semi-dystopian theme throughout, but she didn't. She turned it from something reminiscent of The Handmaid's Tale into a third-rate Las Vegas lounge act. Yes, I know that makes no sense, and therein lies the problem. Sly humor would have worked well, but Atwood's slapstick humor diluted whatever social commentary she was trying to make in this novel. I wanted to like at least one of the characters, but there isn't a likable character in the book. What was Atwood's intent in writing the book? Was it satirical, or an updated take on The Stepford Wives? Was it a commentary about the continuing sexual objectification of women? Or men? I suspect it was none of these. I'm disappointed. It was essentially a book about nothing with a rather well-written teaser in the first chapters.

I just finished this Atwood book. I'm a fan, but have not read all of her stories. I loved The Handmaid's Tale and this was compared to it, but I didn't get nearly the same mesmerizing feeling I had from The Handmaid's Tale. This dystopian society after an economic crash reads too much like a real scenario with Stan and Charmaine living in their car at the outset of the novel. When they hear about the Positron Project they check it out and are selected to participate. What was never really explained was why they couldn't have the community without the prison, meaning giving everyone work and so forth without having to go into prison every other month. That little thing bothered me throughout as it was an important device for the events of the novel, but never explained to my satisfaction. The only thing it gained them was the fact they could take twice as many people for the housing they had since everyone shares a house with their alternates.

It was creative, just not a totally satisfying experience. The Vegas part was done fairly well. I live in the Vegas valley so I'm always interested to see how an author portrays it.

3.5 Stars, rounded up for the store.

One thing Margaret Atwood consistently does to the best of her abilities is give the reader the experience of being a voyeur, even if they don't want to see it all. In The Heart Goes Last's case, there are certainly many of those latter mentioned moments to be had- as the book is a dystopian exploring themes of desperation and desire. I wouldn't recommend reading this unless you are comfortable with sexual themes, because although the book isn't raunchy in my view, some other reviewers were put far from their comfort zones.

As much as I was led to believe this would be some sort of odd sex-fest of a book from other reviews, it really wasn't. Sure, you have characters with exploratory sex lives, but it's set in a dystopian compound where there is a 1950's era revival going on. It's almost a satire, but also an examination of the American obsession with sex- or at least that was my take on it. To live in a world as manicured and merciless as the Positron Project, you have to have guts.

I still feel bad for Charmaine. Some characters are so misguided, you can't help but pity them, and in her case, that's a very apt description. When something sounds too good to be true, it often is, but if you happen to be desperate enough and in dire enough straits, you buy in, regardless of the eventual cost. Her husband Stan is another story- he was very hard to relate to for me.

Some parts of the story are a little too shocking for my taste, but Margaret Atwood always seems to push my buttons. I obviously won't be disclosing those shockers, because they would ruin the book, but it's safe to say if I'm surprised about something, I won't be the only one.

The Heart Goes Last is a dystopian of a kind I haven't seen before. Depending on the person, it can be a fearless narrative or just plain exacerbating to read, and I found myself leaning more toward the fearless narrative camp. I don't kid when I say this book won't be for everyone, so I only recommend it to those who love Margaret Atwood, or aren't afraid to read books that push the limits.

Rating: 3.5 of 5 Stars for a great fearless narrative that kept me on the edge.

I was given a free advance e-copy of this book from Doubleday Books via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. My opinion remains as forthright as ever.

Has Atwood ever been more wry, more erotic, more dystopian in her vision? Maybe, maybe not—but her new novel will be well-received by those who are Atwood fans, even if it’s not a major novel in her oeuvre, and slightly off-putting to new readers. “The Heart Goes Last” is short on cohesive narrative and high on imagination and speculation about what our future might look like, if we look at it through Atwoodian goggles: it appears dark and skewwhiff, frightening but not totally bleak. There are pleasures to be had among the hopelessness in the aptly named town of Consilience (referring to “the principle that evidence from independent, unrelated sources can converge to strong conclusions”), but their price is high. Any Atwood universe (and especially the one in this novel) is how I imagine purgatory to be—but this one is darker than ever. The novel in general left me with a rather unpleasant taste in my mouth and, while it was definitely worth the read, I found it somewhat disappointing in light of my favorite Margaret Atwood novels, “The Robber Bride,” “The Handmaid’s Tale,” and the MaddAddam series.

Stan and Charmaine are caught squarely in the middle of a total economic collapse. Tired of living in their car, they are taken in by a planned community, which has an intriguing proposition. Once inside, the blinders slowly come off and the couple finds themselves in over their heads. Will the lifeline they are being offered be what they need?

The concept of The Heart Goes Last is definitely unique, as it is a utopia in a dystopian world. The characters do not exactly evoke feelings of sympathy, but they are certainly placed in a challenging situation. Belief goes out the window in this one, as the premise could never happen in reality, but I found it entertaining nevertheless. Purposefully over the top, The Heart Goes Last is a quick read with a fast moving plot. Definitely memorable, this book is well off the beaten path and what you would expect from accomplished author Margaret Atwood.

In the near-distant future, Stan and Charmaine are living in a world where the economy has crashed, violence and crime are at an all-time high, and there doesn't seem to be a way out. Once upon a time, Stan and Charmaine had decent jobs, a house they could barely afford, and a seemingly happy marriage. When the economy crashed, they lost everything and now live out of their car. One night, while working at a bar, Charmaine sees an advertisement for a life changing opportunity--move to the town of Consilience, where one can live a secure middle-class life. Stan and Charmaine quickly sign on the dotted line and give themselves over to the Positron (the corporation that runs Consilience). While their prayers seem to be answered, they soon learn all is not as it seems.

The Heart Goes Last is classic Atwood, packed full of twists and turns that will make the reader wonder what's better: a world where one can think for themselves and be free or a world in which one is secure, but has no freedom?

It's not the worst thing you could read, but definitely not what I expected. As other reviewers have stated, about halfway through the tone changes and the plot doesn't seem very consistent. I'm actually forcing myself to read the last bit of the novel now, it's very drawn out. My money would've been better spent on something else.

An enjoyable worthy reading. Atwood's best? No. If possible would have given it 3.5 stars.

The book presents a dismal, near-future society, not dystopian, but man, it's grim. Atwood does make the place & situation very believable, sure none of us wants to end there, but you can see it as a real possibility. The story's idea, the people, the ridiculous but believable "remedy" to the societal chaos, all very engaging and thought-provoking. In the same situation, would I accept living in Positron, safe (?), but under their strict rules? Our impulse reaction is of course NO, but in that society, mmmm.

Others here have done a wonderful job of discussing and interpreting the novel, much, much better than I could. And although one of the aspects I did most thoroughly enjoy was the development of Charmine's character - strange fish, this review is mostly about some thoughts on what I perceive as the book's problem, the way the end of the story was resolved.
Unfortunately, the closing chapters did not feel strong, they had a sort of not-very-believable feeling about them - it felt really unsatisfying. And yes, this takes into account that one has accepted to suspend disbelief of the premise; something Atwood makes very easy for us.
With the great material Atwood presents [mostly wonderfully developed until close to the end], she anyway felt short of my expectations. All in all, not what I was expecting from the author of The Handmaid's Tale.

NB:
I was fanatical, totally mesmerised, for years by The Handmaid's Tale. Deep inside, however, I knew I had sent into my "oblivion brain corner - OBC" the low mood I felt at how the story was wrapped up. Barring this, it would have clashed with the awe I felt for Atwood's work.
It seems more obvious to me, as the years pass, that among good writers' work, when everything seems engaging, the closing seems to be where some of them fail. Must be a very hard part in the art of writing, so I can sometimes use my OBC and continue with one of life's joy - reading. Alas, in The Heart..., most of the ending failings were too big to fit in my OBC.

Far-fetched but compelling premise, especially in light of growing income inequality and disillusionment of the masses in the developed world. I had high hopes for the book at the beginning, but found myself longing for the predictable, cliche-ridden, over-sexed ending so I could move on to another book. I only finished the novel because I'm not one to leave a book unfinished. Characters are largely one-dimensional and not one has a redeeming human quality. Even the most sympathetic character showed little sign of conscience or moral dilemma when faced with a ghastly task.I am sure that was Atwood's intention, but it did not ring true. And is sex ALL anyone ever thinks about?

In the age of big government, technology advances and a splintered economy, I could fathom that places like Consilence and Positron could exist, in a less draconian form of course. And what fodder for fiction. And rich opportunity to explore the human condition. But Atwood took the easy way out and went for a sensational, tied in a bow ending. Pity.

The first half of the book was great. It had a very interesting plot and an interesting couple. The setting in the not so distant future added to the great plot. Then about half way through the book it started to meander and the plot got silly. I do not know why the author could not have continued with the plot and the interesting scenerio of trading your freedom for a home and food. I did not understand the purpose of heading in the direction of manufacturing sex toys which seemed slightly silly and far less serious and suspenseful. Granted the reader did get concerned for the main characters at the end, but the clowns and Las Vegas and other assorted tangents ruined it for me.

Let me start by saying that I am not an expert on Margaret Atwood. I have read two of her other novels and attempted a couple of others, but that's the extent of my experience. If you are a huge Margaret Atwood fan, I'm going to guess that this book is maybe not for you. It certainly wasn't what I was expecting from Ms. Atwood. First off, it was funny - totally not what I was expecting! Also, I came away from this book thinking that it could have been written by someone else or at least a lighter, less intense Ms. Atwood. So, if other works by Ms. Atwood have seemed intimidating to you, too difficult, or maybe not your cup of tea - this book may be a good place for you to start. If you are looking for a typical, complicated, intense Atwood book, you may want to choose a different book. The main two characters, Stan and Charmaine, come across as shallow, uncomplicated, and not the most intelligent or aware. The book isn't so much about the development of these characters, but is rather more of an adventure story with quirky characters (other than Stan Charmaine), weird sex robots, and even a Big Brother type presence trying to keep tabs on everyone. While not what I expected from Ms. Atwood and maybe not the greatest literary work ever, I did find the book to be an easy and entertaining read.

I didn't have any problem with the premise, but when we get into the how and why about half-way through there are plenty of plot holes. The main guy even asks the explainer person and she basically just skims over it. Okay. But for some reason it gets unbearably silly about 2/3 the way through. Not witty, not wry, not absurd, not even funny. It's the kind of silly I always expect when a book or movie warns you that it's "hilarious". I even got down to 15 or so pages and didn't think I could manage to finish. What does Margaret Atwood think she's doing? (3 stars for the writing itself which is always good and I guess for the first half.)

"The Heart Goes Last" is a fun, interesting suburban dystopia in which, due to financial crisis, most people are jobless and homeless. Because of this they sign up for a program in which every other month they switch between normal life living in a house, and living in a prison while another couple lives in the house. Of course, being Atwood and a sci-fi dystopia, things are more sinister than they appear and behind the cheery facade is organ harvesting, sex-bots, and an operation which turns real people into sex slaves.
"The Heart Goes Last" will likely appeal those who enjoyed other Atwood novels, especially "The Hand-Maid's Tale" and the "MaddAddam" books.

While the world in which this novel exists is right up Ms. Atwood's alley, the writing style, characters, and flow are perplexingly unfamiliar. None of it reads like her previous novels: the characters are all a bit one-dimensional and the story is bizarre (and sometimes silly) rather than complex and intriguing. Dialogue, description, tone... None of it has Ms. Atwood's "voice." I spent most of my time feeling puzzled, and rechecked the authorship more than once to make sure I wasn't reading a knock-off by someone with a similar name. It's not a terrible book... It just doesn't read like Atwood.

This is the first book that I have read by this author that I have actually liked. In this dystopian society, Stan and Charmaine join an experimental community called the Positron Project in the town of Consilience in which they will spend every other month as either prisoners or citizens. It seems to be a fair way out of the poverty that they have found themselves in, but things turn out to be not so nice in niceville and Stan and Charmaine get caught up in the thick of it as she has an illicit affair with the man who lives in their house the other month - the alternate, and Stan finds out about it. Oh what a tangled web they all wind up in as this psychological experiment which is sometimes gruesome and other times humorous unfolds. I received this book free to review from Netgalley.

I received this book as a Christmas present. The two main characters Stan and Charmaine are living in their car. Every day is an absolute nightmare but they love each other. Charmaine works as a waitress in a Cafe and Stan just can't get a job. They get by but barely. So when offered a "home" via Positron which happens to be in a prison - they go for it. Once inside, things get really strange and I mean REALLY STRANGE. No spoilers here but definitely worth the read. One thing that bothered me, Margaret said in an interview that she never includes anything in her books which isn't actually happening somewhere in the world. YIKES & MORE YIKES!

Despite the wonderful writing, this is not one of Margaret Atwood's best efforts. While the premise of the story could have been great, the proliferation of silly, unbelievable characters (not meant as parodies, except for the Elvises and Marilyns) and a plot that could never find its center, made for a disappointing read. Many have said they've never read Atwood before and now won't. I say, please try another book by this stellar author (The Handmaid's Tale, Oryx and Crake, The Blind Assassin, Alias Grace) and see what you think. Most writers stumble somewhere, even in distinguished careers.

What a waste of my time reading this novel. Like some others, I ploughed through it, hoping it would improve. Very disappointed. I could not relate to any of the characters and didn't care about them or their sexual obsessions. I agree with another reviewer's description: "smutty, campy, ridiculous." Atwood wrote this? I could scarcely believe it after reading "The Handmaid's Tale." This could have been SO good - but it wasn't. I was glad to reach the ending, even though it was weak. Doesn't deserve one star.

Atwood is back with another dystopian wasteland to horrify and excite our imaginations. This one certainly seems more within the reach of the near future than the MaddAdam world, illustrating what would happen when a crippling depression decimates local economies. I enjoyed this book, but I felt like it fell short of the mark compared to some of her past works. She tended to focus more on the psychology of the characters than on painting a picture of the dystopian world they lived in. This is a matter of personal preference for me, though, and I still devoured the book in the space of a single day.

A strange dystopian tale. A young married couple have fallen on hard times, living in their car.They opt for a better life and take a chance on an experimental life style- which doesn't quite work out the way they imagined. The story started out strong with the promise of something significant about to happen, but seemed to get more and more far fetched with each chapter. In fairness, dystopain is not more usual reading, so maybe I just didn't get it.

In this book, Atwood doesn't treat her female leads very fairly, which really surprised me. Our main character gets almost cruel treatment, even though some mitigating circumstances are also described by the end. It started as a dystopian satire, then turned into an action thriller (will they outsmart the bad guys?) and at times just got silly (a woman with a blue teddy bear? Really?). I can't recommend this one.

No one does dystopia quite like Margaret Atwood. The Heart Goes Last shares a few similarities with The Handmaid's Tale, but quickly veers off in a different direction. By the end of the novel, it's almost slap-stick. And that's a good thing.

Stan and Charmaine go from having great jobs, a nice house, and middle-class respectability to being poor and living in their car, fighting off roving gangs every night. When they see an ad for the Postiron Project, it looks like the solution to all of their problems. Those accepted into the project get a house, clothing, food, and steady jobs -- but for each month they live in middle-class splendor, they have to work a month in the Positron Prison, sleeping in jail cells and performing the menial tasks that helps the community survive. The community, Consilience, restricts the media its citizens are exposed to and the citizens are not allowed to interact with their "alternates" (the people who live in their homes during the months they are in prison), and Stan and Charmaine are pretty sure there are cameras watching them as well.

Things go well for Stan and Charmaine as long as they follow the rules. However, it's not long before Charmaine breaks the most important rule by engaging in an affair with Max, Stan's alternate. When they are discovered, the novel takes dark twists and turns before all the characters emerge at the end in a near screwball comedy involving "Prostibots," Marilyn Monroe, Elvis, and a blue teddy bear.

I love Margaret Atwood's writing. She captures my mind and sends me to places of wild images, marred futures and expertly crafted characters. This book has a great beginning and middle but the end,well it felt rushed and wrapped up a little too quickly and nearly for me. Still worth the time to read, but she has much better overall work available.

Interesting story but not at all what I thought what I'd be reading. Kind of sounded like an apocalypse happened and people had to do drastic things to find food and shelter. If it was supposed to be a love story, it missed the mark but it did express how a person can be consumed by something or someone and forget about what the heart really needs.

Margaret Atwood's dystopian literature is like a voice crying out in the wilderness - beware the endangerment of the world as we know it and the changes that will ensue!! This book felt like a hybrid of Oryx and Crake and The Handmaid's Tale - both focus on what will happen when capitalists run amuck and what occurs when obsessive sex replaces love. This is loaded with discussion topics and book groups are going to have a hay day with it. I would have given it five stars but Charmaine's many flashbacks to when life with Stan was good became tedious and something to be skimmed through.

While this one was certainly not as mind-blowing as I'd initially hoped/expected from a standout like Margaret Atwood, it was not lacking in some of the thought-provoking elements for which she is known; I took some time after finishing to ponder the messages within and had some emotions creep up that I'd not expected.

It may be classified as dystopian fiction, but the events described to main characters Charmaine and Stan could happen to anyone, anywhere in our current society: Stan is an educated young man who lost his job in robotics and is left with no options for employment; Charmaine is taking on as many serving shifts as she can in a crappy establishment (with an even crappier boss); she lives for small things, like nail polish, that she splurges on after she gets paid and they survive on day-old remnants from local restaurants and businesses while living in their car. What makes this story different is the "solution" that is offered to them and, although somewhat farfetched, Atwood certainly made an impression.

Without giving too much away, Charmaine and Stan live in a semi-controlled prison environment for one month and then live in the home that they share with their "alternates" (the alternates are doing time while Charmaine and Stan are in the house) the next month and back and forth they go every month. The "real criminals" have been fettered away (you'll have to read the book to find out more on that arrangement) and they each have jobs both inside and outside of prison; what better way to ensure the safety and prosperity of the community's population, right? But how much of your free will would you sacrifice to have secure living arrangements in an otherwise insecure environment? Here's an opportunity to have it all...but not quite! What is most important to you; what would you miss, if you didn't have it, that you haven't even thought about yet?

More attention has been paid to our nation's justice and prison systems via media outlets and writers lately and I couldn't be happier; as a contribution to the conversation, I think Atwood's latest work pokes fun at some of the laughable solutions that have been proposed to the problem of the ever-growing prison population and also stands as a reminder that we are often imprisoned without knowing it.

What are you willing to give up for security? Would you give up your free will?

Margaret Atwood's new novel The Heart Goes Last is part of her Positron series, the first I have read. It has twists and turns that swept me into the plot line, and even when things got very icky I kept reading to discover what the heck was going on.

The novel is about Stan and Charmaine, a couple who have lost everything in an economic collapse. They are living in their car, fearful of night time attacks for theirs is a society were murder is common in the struggle for limited resources. Charmaine sees an advertisement for the Positron Project in the town of Consilience, offering full employment, a home, and work. They attend the marketing session. and are accepted. Charmaine buys into the dream world and Stan wants to let her have it.

The society is based on people willing to work one month in 'prison' for one month of normalcy.

The reader knows something is not right here and we want to find out what is behind this ideal society. It involves a complete loss of personal control, smarmy and immoral business practices, and scientific marvels that benefit the rich and powerful.

I warn you that there are very seedy things going on. Sex is used for control, and sexual desire and addiction is the motivation for some amazing technological developments.

Our couple learn they are pawns in a convoluted and bizarre scheme that will impact the future of Positron. Murder, threat of 'termination', loss of will, posing at robots--what these poor people endure!

In the end Charmaine and Stan get their just rewards, find peace, and learn how to love each other and enjoy what the heart has to offer.

I thank the publisher and NetGalley for a free ebook in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

Margaret Atwood is that rare writer who can be imaginative, funny, caustic, and reflective at the same time she fully entertains most readers with a compelling story. I thoroughly enjoyed her latest novel titled, The Heart Goes Last. She takes readers to a society like our own in a time quite similar to ours, injects evil and love, and offers a mirror to modern life that will lead many readers to squirm and smile. Any reader who enjoys fine writing and who likes to laugh and think will find much to enjoy in this novel.

Rating: Five-star (I love it)

I love Margaret Atwood's writing. She captures my mind and sends me to places of wild images, marred futures and expertly crafted characters. This book has a great beginning and middle but the end,well it felt rushed and wrapped up a little too quickly and nearly for me. Still worth the time to read, but she has much better overall work available.

Interesting story but not at all what I thought what I'd be reading. Kind of sounded like an apocalypse happened and people had to do drastic things to find food and shelter. If it was supposed to be a love story, it missed the mark but it did express how a person can be consumed by something or someone and forget about what the heart really needs.

Margaret Atwood's dystopian literature is like a voice crying out in the wilderness - beware the endangerment of the world as we know it and the changes that will ensue!! This book felt like a hybrid of Oryx and Crake and The Handmaid's Tale - both focus on what will happen when capitalists run amuck and what occurs when obsessive sex replaces love. This is loaded with discussion topics and book groups are going to have a hay day with it. I would have given it five stars but Charmaine's many flashbacks to when life with Stan was good became tedious and something to be skimmed through.

While this one was certainly not as mind-blowing as I'd initially hoped/expected from a standout like Margaret Atwood, it was not lacking in some of the thought-provoking elements for which she is known; I took some time after finishing to ponder the messages within and had some emotions creep up that I'd not expected.

It may be classified as dystopian fiction, but the events described to main characters Charmaine and Stan could happen to anyone, anywhere in our current society: Stan is an educated young man who lost his job in robotics and is left with no options for employment; Charmaine is taking on as many serving shifts as she can in a crappy establishment (with an even crappier boss); she lives for small things, like nail polish, that she splurges on after she gets paid and they survive on day-old remnants from local restaurants and businesses while living in their car. What makes this story different is the "solution" that is offered to them and, although somewhat farfetched, Atwood certainly made an impression.

Without giving too much away, Charmaine and Stan live in a semi-controlled prison environment for one month and then live in the home that they share with their "alternates" (the alternates are doing time while Charmaine and Stan are in the house) the next month and back and forth they go every month. The "real criminals" have been fettered away (you'll have to read the book to find out more on that arrangement) and they each have jobs both inside and outside of prison; what better way to ensure the safety and prosperity of the community's population, right? But how much of your free will would you sacrifice to have secure living arrangements in an otherwise insecure environment? Here's an opportunity to have it all...but not quite! What is most important to you; what would you miss, if you didn't have it, that you haven't even thought about yet?

More attention has been paid to our nation's justice and prison systems via media outlets and writers lately and I couldn't be happier; as a contribution to the conversation, I think Atwood's latest work pokes fun at some of the laughable solutions that have been proposed to the problem of the ever-growing prison population and also stands as a reminder that we are often imprisoned without knowing it.

What are you willing to give up for security? Would you give up your free will?

Margaret Atwood's new novel The Heart Goes Last is part of her Positron series, the first I have read. It has twists and turns that swept me into the plot line, and even when things got very icky I kept reading to discover what the heck was going on.

The novel is about Stan and Charmaine, a couple who have lost everything in an economic collapse. They are living in their car, fearful of night time attacks for theirs is a society were murder is common in the struggle for limited resources. Charmaine sees an advertisement for the Positron Project in the town of Consilience, offering full employment, a home, and work. They attend the marketing session. and are accepted. Charmaine buys into the dream world and Stan wants to let her have it.

The society is based on people willing to work one month in 'prison' for one month of normalcy.

The reader knows something is not right here and we want to find out what is behind this ideal society. It involves a complete loss of personal control, smarmy and immoral business practices, and scientific marvels that benefit the rich and powerful.

I warn you that there are very seedy things going on. Sex is used for control, and sexual desire and addiction is the motivation for some amazing technological developments.

Our couple learn they are pawns in a convoluted and bizarre scheme that will impact the future of Positron. Murder, threat of 'termination', loss of will, posing at robots--what these poor people endure!

In the end Charmaine and Stan get their just rewards, find peace, and learn how to love each other and enjoy what the heart has to offer.

I thank the publisher and NetGalley for a free ebook in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

Margaret Atwood is that rare writer who can be imaginative, funny, caustic, and reflective at the same time she fully entertains most readers with a compelling story. I thoroughly enjoyed her latest novel titled, The Heart Goes Last. She takes readers to a society like our own in a time quite similar to ours, injects evil and love, and offers a mirror to modern life that will lead many readers to squirm and smile. Any reader who enjoys fine writing and who likes to laugh and think will find much to enjoy in this novel.

Rating: Five-star (I love it)

The Heart Goes Last by Margaret Atwood is a dystopian novel from an author who has written frighteningly prescient novels. I mean, A Handmaid’s Tale seemed impossible until the neo-conservatives started making noise in United States politics.

In this novel, Stan and Charmaine are living in their car as their lives and society have fallen apart. The economic collapse has resulted in the couple being jobless, homeless, and facing a violent world where they have no choice but to find a way of surviving. When they learn about an opportunity to give them a haven, a home and employment, naturally they are willing to do anything to be safe. And much will be demanded of both as they sign on the dotted lines.

Although neither Stan nor Charmaine are especially likeable, you do come to care about what will happen to them. There are many twists and turns, fueled by the desperation to live a “typical” life. But when society itself has fallen apart, what is typical and how much can anyone sacrifice to escape an ugly reality?

Atwood does a wonderful job of exploring the cost of sacrificing personal freedom for security. It’s easy to see the implications in our own media as politicians continue to warn us about the dangers of terrorism and illegal immigrants, highlighting how our economy continues to struggle, and we’re on the brink of disaster from within so vote for me and I’ll save you and yours. Yes, my expectations were very high for this novel because it was favorably compared with The Blind Assassin in the blurb but I don’t think this novel comes even close to being as brilliant as the former novel. And with all the unexpected twists and turns presented, there were a few that I saw coming a mile away, including the “big shock” at the end of the novel. Nonetheless, it was a compelling read and I would recommend it to anyone who enjoyed Gone Girl and or loves dystopian literature. Also, I was not aware that this was the fourth of a series of novels, and it definitely works as a stand-alone novel. I may or may not go back and read some of the previous volumes. So many books, so little time.

First, just to get it "out of the way" let me state, unequivocally that this is an exquisitely written, dystopian adventure that fully lives up to what anybody with a whit of sense has come to expect from Ms Atwood

Now

This is a HORRIBLE title.

Not because one can't make a case for it based on the plot, but because it makes the book sound like a Harlequin Romance from to 60s1

This is most assuredly not that

Second, if you go to the the store page you'll see, next to the (did I mention, "horrible"?) title the word "Positron" in parentheses.

You may know, or think you know, what this means, but for those of you who, like me, don't, lemme 'splain.

It seems that Ms. Atwood who, being only a kid of 75, is always experimenting with the latest trends, and, in that vein, has written 3 short (under 60 pages) pieces for Kindle that follow the adventures of our main characters in the Positron" world (I may get this wrong... I haven't read them)

What I CAN tell you is that you needn't have read any of these in order to read this book which, may (or may not) recap those 3 short pieces... or may be a completely different take altogether.

The book DOES introduce us to protagonists Stan & Charmaine and the Positron Project and the town of Consiliance without, in any way, seeming to expect us to know anything about them except what is contained herein, so...

Look, it's the latest Margaret Atwood novel

If you need to know more than that, you haven't been paying attention for the last (literary) decade or so.

I had been very excited to read this book, but having finished it today, I am disappointed. Initially it was exciting, but then got a little boring, then confusing, (lots of holes in the plot, ridiculous coincidences), and finally scenes that were just plain silly. I found myself rolling my eyes. I never really got invested in any of the characters and sometimes the writing seemed -- amateurish. I can't believe I am saying this about Margaret Atwood's work, as I know she is capable of so much more.

Who says life can't be perfect? Margaret Atwood captures the fear, frustration and loneliness as Charmaine and Stan try to leave a cruel life behind. Instead, they find themselves in a sheltered town where inhabitants share everything - jobs, lives, romance and the perception of "perfect." Does "perfect" exist? And at what cost? Would you pay the ultimate price? The characters in Atwood's novel discover some things are just too expensive. Remember, if it sounds too good to be try, it probably is.

Interesting read. Wasn’t sure what to expect but stayed engaged throughout. Liked how the stories let weaving in and out for characters. Wasn’t expecting the ending and not altogether sure I liked it haha So thumbs up.

Dystopian novels tend to be pretty bleak, but here Margaret Atwood has injected a lot of humor, so that the tone is quite different. Charmaine and Stan are a married couple living in their car after an economic collapse has devastated the eastern U.S. Charmaine is working as a bartender so that they can buy food, but the car is their only defense against the crazed hoodlums who attack in the night. Then Charmaine hears about a closed community (once in, you can never leave) called Consilience where everyone has a job and decent housing. She convinces Stan to take the hook. The premise of the community is that everyone lives as normal people every other month, but on alternate months they are prisoners, doing more menial jobs, while another couple occupies their house. The two alternating couples are forbidden to meet as they swap places each month, but Charmaine soon finds herself in a reckless affair with Max, who lives in their house while Charmaine and Stan are in prison. To me this seemed a bit like Cold War Communism, where everyone is working for the good of the community, but the community leaders are definitely reaping some sort of monetary benefits while keeping close tabs on what the citizens are up to. The humor comes in the form of the funny business between Charmaine and Max and the ramifications for Stan, who finds a lusty note but misinterprets its authorship. Charmaine and Stan are unwitting pawns in a complicated scheme that involves Elvis robots, blue knitted teddy bears, and a drug that will knock a person out and then cause them to imprint on the first thing they see with two eyes. The gritty start belies the nutty stuff that happens later in the book, making it both chilling and somewhat absurd at the same time. This combination appealed to me in a big way.

What a disappointment. I'm a fan of Atwood's so I was surprised how bad this was. The main characters were shallow, stupid and boring. A lot of time was spent in the random thoughts of one of the dizziest, most oblivious women to ever be created in fiction and it was painful to slog through those parts. The story meandered and flagged and the ending was the laziest conclusion to a book I've probably ever seen. I wish I could get every minute of my life back that I wasted reading this. My opinion of the author has plummeted and I may never pick up another copy of anything she writes.

This book is entirely about sex, and sadly the book description does nothing to tell you that. It's one thing to have infidelity as a plot device, which the book description mentions. It's another to have sex, badly written at that, on virtually every page. I stuck with it all the way until the end, hoping because it was Margaret Atwood that it would get better, but it doesn't. This book is like a high school student's first attempt at writing both alternate-future sci fi and a romance novel in one assignment. Disappointing.

This is a decent light read - nothing particularly special about it, but it moves at a fast pace and is pretty unpredictable. It starts out rather unbelievable and gets rather preposterous (almost to the point of parody) by the final 1/3. Although there was nothing particularly bad about it, I wouldn't recommend it to anyone who isn't already either a Margaret Atwood fan or else a voracious post-apocalyptic/dystopina future fan.

I’ve read that Ms. Atwood prefers her dystopian books to be called speculative fiction rather than science fiction, since her invented worlds could actually happen. And while the Positron Project isn’t a fantasy world, it’s a strange world indeed. A couple struggling to survive in a manic dangerous world are given a chance to live at Consilience where they will live one month in a lovely “normal” neighborhood in their own home and alternate months as slave workers in a prison. Of course, all is not as it seems.

This is a lighter book than I expected from Ms. Atwood, though there are certainly undercurrents of horror and evil. I was pulled into the story in the beginning but it began to turn me off a bit with the Elvis sexbotics. But then again as mentioned, I hadn’t expected such a light hearted book about such a dark subject. There is a very suspenseful moment about three quarters of the way into the book and I had no idea which way it would go – will she or won’t she – will love triumph. The author expertly directed that section of the story.

She has made many social and political statements with the writing of this book and I think a book club would enjoy hashing over the meanings. This book will alight much literary discussion. I can tell through each page what fun the author was having writing this book and I also had some fun moments. I’m glad I read it as I wouldn’t have wanted to miss anything Ms. Atwood wrote. But personally I prefer the drama of “The Handmaid’s Tale” and “Alias Grace”. Due to the excellence of the writing and social commentary behind the humor and the fact that I’ll still be thinking about this book for weeks to come, I will give it 4 stars.

This book was given to me by the publisher through Edelweiss in return for an honest review.

Margaret Atwood's new novel was a bit of a surprise. The plot is much more straightforward & less obscure than some of her books (the Oryx & Crake trilogy, for instance), and has more of a satirical and humorous edge to the story. It gets pretty dirty, too, in terms of the sexy stuff and language! (Ha!)

Originally appearing in four installments online in Byliner, *The Heart Goes Last* tells about a two people in a near-future society severely damaged by economic chaos. The featured couple, Stan and Charmaine, are living in their car when the story begins, but they soon receive an opportunity to improve their lives by moving into a very unusual quasi-utopian community. That's when the book really begins to move into territory previously mastered by Vonnegut or maybe even Palahniuk. There are various zany twists and turns (although I guessed the final one pretty easily), enough to keep me reading with interest all the way through. It's no masterpiece, but *The Heart Goes Last* was definitely entertaining.

I loved the beginning of this story & where it was heading, however the sexbots thing really through me off. I felt the story fell flat from there & quickly had an inkling of what the twist at the end would be. I still love Atwood but this dims in comparison to The Handmaiden's Tale.

Nothing to write home about. Not even really a true 3 stars. The premise is fascinating, and as some other reviewer said there is a Positron series. This interests me and I am curious to see if she did something better with those than this one.

This one had potential and it fell very short. I LOVED handmaid's tale and have gotten leads to try Oryx and Crake and The Blind assassin, so I will check those out.

Not worth your time.

As a longtime fan of Atwood's books, I was excitedly anticipating reading this latest. Scratch the surface, and you find Atwood and her signature provoking questions in a dystopian world. But, darnit, my brain just didn't want to have to work that hard. I wanted to finish because I *am* a fan but the story just didn't keep me hooked. I understand this book was compiled from a series which may explain its disjointed raison d'etre.

I loved The Handmaid's Tale and Oryxx and Crake, but The Heart Goes Last is not even close. The general premise for the story is plausible, but that's it. Everything else is nonsense. Although her writing is good and some of the satire hits home, this was a weak effort by Ms. Atwood.

I am not convinced that this is a science fiction novel of the near future or an alternative version of the current day in another dimension.

It envisages a time of extreme inequality not unlike many other scenarios although I am reminded more of Robocop than anything else.

As in Robocop and many other futuristic portrayals the villain of the piece is a greedy capitalist who thinks up a rather unique way of self enrichment while at the same time solving one of society's worst ills.

The book is advertised as being a new twist but frankly their is little of novelty in the scenario described.

I am not a fan of Attwood although I have read some of her other works but I would not rate it one of her best. It is a possible pointer for what lies ahead and is a critique of the existing system of self-perpetuating elites, not just in the USA but around the world.

Like Soylent Green there is a political message but unlike the former it is not as shocking or as horrific. I do not find the characters terribly believable, nor the ability of some to pull the wool over some of the other main characters eyes, but that is just me.

Entertaining yes, enjoyable, somewhat but that's it.

Entertaining, engaging and simple to follow but a little predictable. The characters are likable but not very deep. Would make a good television mini series. Nice to read for a distraction without being too complex.

I liked this book, but I expected more from Atwood. The story goes really fast, and the pace - combined with a writing style I wasn't totally into - was a strange balance with her really excellent overall narrative. Conceptually, there's hardly a writer out there who can touch Atwood, but I wish she had given the concept more time to develop and structured it a little more formally.

Actual Rating 1.5

The Heart Goes Last had some really interesting story elements and plot points going for it.

The main characters, Stan and Charmaine, are living in their car after economic collapse, with the money from Charmaine’s bar job their only form of income. They both used to have steady jobs, a nice home, and a bright future. They wanted to have children some day.

But now they have to pull strings in order to shower, and they only have the money to wash their clothes at a laundromat when they start to get particularly pungent.

Then Charmaine sees the advertisement.

Consilience is a new social experiment which offers stable jobs and a home, so long as they spend every second month in a prison-like environment. Prison-like because all the really criminal elements are quickly weeded out, leaving just the upstanding folk who signed on for this experiment.

________

Then it occurred to the planners of Positron, he says – and this was brilliant – that if prisons were scaled out and handled rationally, they could be win-win viable economic units. So many jobs could be spawned by them: construction jobs, maintenance jobs, cleaning jobs, guard jobs. Hospital jobs, uniform-sewing jobs, shoemaking jobs, jobs in agriculture, if there was a farm attached: an ever-flowing cornucopia of jobs. Medium-size towns with large penitentiaries could maintain themselves, and the people inside such towns could live in middle-class comfort. And if every citizen were either a guard or a prisoner, the result would be full employment: half would be prisoners, the other half would be engaged in the business of tending the prisoners in some way or other. Or tending those who tended them.
And since it was unrealistic to expect certified criminality from 50 percent of the population, the fair thing would be for everyone to take turns: one month in, one month out. Think of the savings, with every dwelling serving two sets of residents! It was time-share taken to its logical conclusion.
________

Of course they sign up right away. What could possibly go wrong?

The rest of this review can be found at: http://magazine.100percentrock.com/reviews/book-reviews/201510/139376

I grabbed this, among some other books, for a long trip I took. I just need to pass time on multiple airplane and train rides. This was the last of the three books I read and it was, easily, the hardest to read. By that I mean that there was nothing interesting about the plot or the people. I honestly didn't care what happened next. I was forcing myself to turn the page as a chore just to get to the end.

I can't recommend it. It just seemed like it was written out very quickly and pushed to market with a big name.

This completely fell apart not even half way through. Long before I got to the Marilyn and Elvis impersonators and the sexbots, I was ready to toss it in a dumpster. DUMB, DUMB characters with nothing interesting or redeeming about any of them. I didn't love them. I didn't hate them. I cared nothing for any of them. This was just so bad. Unbelievably bad. Mind numbing bad. If you are expecting A Handmaid's Tale you will be very disappointed. The premise was really fascinating. I got that on the back cover. I should have stopped there.

I normally love Atwood's work, but this novel was the waste of a candle. It starts off promising, but then seems quickly to forget what it is and where it's going. Discursive, unfocused, uneven, and unsuccessful (and embarrassing) attempts at humor -- this book was probably published because of the author's previous excellence. Fortunately she will leave a legacy that this novel does not represent.

As a newcomer to Atwood I cannot make comparisons with the rest of her works. I was intrigued by a Sunday paper's magazine review of this book so reserved it at my local library.
I loved the whole concept of the consilience/positron way of life and all the social, political and economic ideologies that brought the whole package together. I could envisage this way of life becoming a reality in the distant future. I raced through the first half/ three quarters of the book only to find that the remaining chapters seemed to descend into slapstick farce. It felt, to me, as though someone else had taken over the writing from the author of the first half.
The human frailties that pervade throughout the book are a constant reminder of how human beings struggle to relate to each other.
I am glad I read the book regardless of being disappointed in how it turned out as it is food for thought indeed. The sex theme that runs through the book, for me, became a little tedious.

I have read and really enjoyed other novels by Margaret Atwood but this one was a bit of a disappointment. At first I found the interaction between the two couples who are the main characters to be humorous and reminiscent of a romantic farce and so a refreshing change from most dystopic novels. But by the end I had lost interest in what happened to them. Meh.

This story of a married couple who trade living in their car for a utopian community experiment starts off with an interesting premise and presents interesting commentary on contemporary society, but it all goes downhill from there.

Interesting concept, but the characters were not very deep and developed, was hoping for more of a twist or unexpected something from them... The plot was interesting, but like the characters no big surprises or parts were something shocking occurs, just a strange tale of a future that's grim.

At times, during my difficult stroll through this novel, I felt like the pimple-faced Sophomore whose English teacher is telling the class what a joy and treasure it must have been to have read "The Canterbury Tales" that she assigned. I, like my Sophomore friend, thinks that the latest Atwood novel is both lurid and ridiculous and further wonders if the teacher (or the other reviewers) are talking about the same book that I just read!

While I have admired most of the author's previous submissions, this novel, is in a word, "godawful!". Atwood's present interpretation of dystopia is a diffuse world that has no values or morals whatsoever. In this perverse series of delusions we skip from one lurid sexual fantasy to another and from one meaningless and empty relationship to the next. In the end, we are then led to believe that this whole disgusting pantomime may have simply been in our own mind all along and that our only goal in life should be overt sexual freedom to do what we wish with whoever comes along next. Shame on you Margaret, you could have done so much better.....................

I almost didn't finish the book it was so bad. Amateur writing at its best (or in this case, just a reason to get paid! ) It started as a semi love story, semi eurotica, then finally moved to a real plot, almost 2/3rds into the book. Only reason I finished it, it's because I needed to find out why so many people liked it. Still don't know!

Some interesting ideas, but doesn't hang together as a novel. The character of Con is introduced as if he will play an interesting role, but then he doesn't. Something about the book reminded me of the Walking Dead. I kept reading to see what would happen, but ultimately I didn't care. Not one of Atwood's best; would have been more effective as a short story in the vein of George Saunders' work.

I have to say I enjoyed this weird read. I don't normally like books where I don't actually like one of the main characters. I thought the morals of the characters were terrible but it fit the books story so it's alright. It was not at all what I was expecting it would be like but I got into it and needed to find out what happens to Stan and Charmaine.

I enjoyed The Handmaid's Tale and thought I would be getting more of the same. This was just bizarrely tawdry...much of it unnecessary. Frankly, I wrinkled my nose a lot and felt a bit gross while reading. (And I did not just fall off the turnip truck.)

While I had to force myself to finish The Handmaid's Tale because it was so atmospheric, this story is a lot more airy, more loose.

Similarly, the protagonists are a little flat and the outcome of their actions are a little predictable but I finished this book in a few days so I'm not complaining.

In true Margaret Atwood form, this book was a great read. Atwood takes present day scenarios and build characters around those plots. Here, the world has disintegrated into crime, unemployment and poverty and the world the characters enter into seem to offer respite from that world. That is the initial plot line and it grows from there. Great book!

This is an awful book! I'm SO glad I got it from the library and didn't buy it. The characters are totally unbelievable and erratic, the plot starts out to be interesting and goes straight down the tubes, and it's not even well written! I've loved Margaret Atwood's other books but this is a travesty. It made me angry and sad. Dpare yourself and give it a pass. Oh and by the way, the audiobook readers (a man and a woman) are awful too.

Margaret Atwood is a quality writer. She knows how to develop a solid plot and develop dynamic characters. I didn't see any logical reason why it made sense to put non-criminals in prison if the actual criminals have been euthanized. Full employment could have been achieved in other ways. Altogether the book was decent and well above most of the free books or inexpensive self-published indie authors I've read.

Atwood again takes us into the dystopian future (21st century) with Stan and Charmaine trying to eke out a living in the economically shattered, post-recession Northeast. The security of their lives gone, the couple now live in their car, eating discarded food, and barely sleeping for fear of violence from roaming gangs. When they hear that the Positron Project offers stability in a closed community, they have nothing to lose by applying. So they think. Atwood plays with her readers, segueing from the threat of Big Brother to a madcap escape involving Elvis and Marilyn impersonators in Vegas. To address the twists and turns of the story would be to give too much away. Though not in the same league as “Handmaid’s Tale” of “Blind Assassin,” she presents a thought-provoking, scary look at our possible futures.

Margaret Atwood is always good for a mind screw, and her latest book definitely delivers. I don't want to say too much because I wouldn't want to spoil anything. Instead, I will just suggest that you enjoy a fast paced journey through heaven, hell, intrigue, and a scarily plausible future.

What a strange campy book! One page could have me very anxious and the next could have me laughing out loud. Atwood again puts the reader in a bleak dystopian world where there is one bright spot - kind of reminiscent of the walled village in The Walking Dead. The reader knows all is not what it seems. I liked the first half of the book and the world-building of both worlds much better than the second half.

Not the best Atwood book I've read, but this one did have me laughing and shaking my head at the campiness of it all.

Received from Net Galley

I'm an old Atwood reader, first reading her poetry in 1975 and then Surfacing.
The dystopia books are great until this one. There was no edginess but I suppose that was the point--a more goofy comic book style but it wasn't for me. I hope she got new readers but I can't imagine her fans buying in to this trite writing. An older disgruntled reader

2.5 stars. I was excited when I received an advance copy of a Margaret Atwood novel, but unfortunately this one was too bizarre for me. I did find myself laughing out loud through some parts of the dark, twisted humor, but mostly those were laughs from shock. There is no denying that Atwood can write. And she can develop complex and unique characters, but I didn't understand the point of this one when I finished. Sadly, it just felt like a time-waster for me.

I've been a fan of several of Margaret Atwood's other novels. But this one just seems bleak and ugly - and tedious. If there is social commentary or some other point buried in this slow-moving, icky story, I can't see it. Not one of Atwood's better efforts.

Omg, I just wasted a week in my life reading this ridiculous, obscene story!! It started promising, but went OFF THE RAILS. I'm so disappointed and disheartened because I could have chose a better book. What a waste!!!

Disappointing, somewhat silly,and childish with a few interesting ideas.I don't know whether to call it science fiction or fantasy,but certainly not literature.I should have made better us of my time reading something else.

Within a dystopic world, it's the typical "more than you bargained for" kind of story. Characters left with few other options join a community that is very reminiscent of Stepford Wives where everything looks great at first and the rest of the book is spent showing you just how wrong that impression is. The characters aren't fully developed, and I found the images I had in my head of the characters changed drastically a couple of times as they responded to situations inconsistently. Overall, if you've liked Atwood's other dystopic novels, you'll probably like this one, though I enjoyed Handmaid's Tale a lot more.

Margaret Atwood is having a moment — I really wanted to love this book, but just didn’t. The premise is intriguing and kept me reading. The navel gazing was too heavy, the characters all took themselves too seriously, and I never found myself invested in any of them.

3.5 stars -- Freedom of choice is an important concept and one which most of us hold dear. When Stan and Charmaine are living in their car after a severe economic downturn, they don't have many choices. Hungry and dirty, they jump at an offer that seems too good to be true! If they choose to commit to the Positron Project, they'll have jobs and a home again. They'll have to alternate living in their house with stints in the prison there, but won't it be nice to have security and comfort? The only caveat -- once they go in, they can never go back out. Things go very well at the beginning, but when Charmaine has a forbidden affair, all starts to unravel quickly.

I really liked the premise and the first part of the book, but the "unraveling" of Positron and the bizarre events that happen to Stan and Charmaine really stupefied me. I like a good dystopian novel with all of the scary possibilities that might be in the dark future, but some of this was so far out and off-the-wall that it fizzled. I had trouble forcing myself back into the story to finish it, and ultimately didn't really care too much what happened to Stan and Charmaine -- who weren't very likable characters.

I've read many of Margaret Atwood's novels and liked most, and I'm sure fans will want to read this latest, but I didn't feel it was quite up to her usual standards and I was left just feeling ambivalent. Parts were quite entertaining as social commentary and definitely some interesting points to ponder or discuss. But as a whole, I felt let down and glad to be done with Stan and Charmaine.

Thank you to NetGalley, Doubleday BooksNan A. Talese for the e-book ARC to review.

Young marrieds Stan and Charmaine once had good jobs and good lives and were happy. However, a severe downturn of the economy took from them almost everything they had. They are jobless, living out of their car, and targets for roving gangs of young people in the same or worse straits. They hear of the Positron Project and a place called Consilience that could give them hope. But there are some major catches:
• Media is highly censored in Consilience; residents can pick up only movies and TV from the 1950’s.
• Residents live in homes similar to standard suburban cookie-cutter homes and must abide by strict rules.
• Residents may never leave Consilience.
• Residents of Consilience spend one month in the suburban type homes, then one month in the local prison, with the first of each month the date to change over.
• During the time the residents of a home are in the prison, there are alternate residents; the families are never to meet each other.
Considering what the outside world holds, these sacrifices don’t seem to be too much, but, for Stan and Charmaine, there are entanglements. Both of them end up in grave danger.

Though teenagers like dystopian works, this one, like Atwood’s THE HANDMAID’S TALE, is absolutely for adults or very sophisticated older teens. Though it is very well-written and engaging, saying it is harsh is putting it mildly. There are very harsh themes and incidents, even in the seemingly perfect Consilience world, and Stan’s language, especially, is peppered with the “f-bomb.” I must hold at four stars simply as a warning about the extreme harshness.

I thought the book was unbelievably long boring and tedious. I gave it three stars because I managed to finish it. I felt the story line was just too unbelievable and usually the happy ending makes you feel better but in this one I just wanted to roll my eyes.

The book was okay. Went off on horrible tangent at the end. But the female narrator was like fingernails on a chalkboard. Sometimes it takes me awhile to get used to the narrator but she o lay got worse. If I see Cassandra Campbell as narrator on any other book, I will not read

Economic depression sends a couple looking for a better life in the ultimate gated community, a prison. Alexandria (Walking Dead) meets Stepford Wives with a dash of steamy. Atwood keeps you on your toes with unexpected plot twists!

Atwood has become so mannered this book is nearly unreadable. It has many of the surface elements (post-apocolyptic society with bizarre rules, kinky sex, attempt to reach freedom) that worked so well in A Handmaid's Tale, but in this case they are thrown in the way a bad cook uses cream of mushroom soup.

This book is absolutely terrible. What started out as an intriguing concept quickly spirals downward into a totally silly, insipid plot. Characters are just plain dumb. This is so disappointing coming from Margaret Atwood. There is nothing suspenseful and I was left shaking my head. Possibilibots? Really? Overlook the fact that your wife cheated on you then was perfectly happy to kill you? Think you have been programmed to love only your husband but still lust after another man and not realize you were not programmed? Too much nonsense here. Save your money.

I love Margaret's writing as you never know what to expect. This book plays right into the ever hopeful human desire and belief that in the end things will get better. Keep writing and show the world that even in the darkest hour there will shine a light. As my grandmother used to say, always darkest before the dawn

While it was an enjoyable read, I was disappointed by the book's conclusion. The novel had real promise at the beginning given its emphasis on post economic crash themes, but some of its best ideas remained undeveloped and it took a pulp fiction turn fixated on fantasy and sex. Character development was lacking throughout. Nevertheless, it was a pleasant enough way to spend the afternoon.

I doubt could read any Atwood book without giving it a five star rating! She's my absolute favorite author--and in this work she did not disappoint. There was a sweetness, a mystery, and a romance--making this work quite different from her Madd Adam trilogy. But that may be the best thing about Atwood--she's so brilliantly creative that each book "sounds" and "feels" very different from another. She is unique every time. Love this book!

Really enjoyed it. Particularly the ending. Fantastic look into what could happen if you gave up and handed all of your choices to someone else (you didn't know) to make for you. Fantastic to think this could all be us right now, anyway...I had been avoiding Atwood's writing for a few years after Oryx and Crake, but I've decided I love her again, and all is forgiven.