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The Men
The Men | Sandra Newman
4 posts | 5 read | 3 to read
From the author of The Heavens, a dazzling, mindbending novel in which all people with a Y chromosome mysteriously disappear from the face of the earth Deep in the California woods on an evening in late August, Jane Pearson is camping with her husband Leo and their five-year-old son Benjamin. As dusk sets in, she drifts softly to sleep in a hammock strung outside the tent where Leo and Benjamin are preparing for bed. At that moment, every single person with a Y chromosome vanishes around the world, disappearing from operating theaters mid-surgery, from behind the wheels of cars, from arguments and acts of love. Children, adults, even fetuses are gone in an instant. Leo and Benjamin are gone. No one knows why, how, or where. After the Disappearance, Jane forces herself to enter a world she barely recognizes, one where women must create new ways of living while coping with devastating grief. As people come together to rebuild depopulated industries and distribute scarce resources, Jane focuses on reuniting with an old college girlfriend, Evangelyne Moreau, leader of the Commensalist Party of America, a rising political force in this new world. Meanwhile, strange video footage called "The Men" is being broadcast online showing images of the vanished men marching through barren, otherworldly landscapes. Is this just a hoax, or could it hold the key to the Disappearance? From the author of The Heavens, The Men is a gripping, beautiful, and disquieting novel of feminist utopias and impossible sacrifices that interrogates the dream of a perfect society and the conflict between individual desire and the good of the community.
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review
BC_Dittemore
The Men | Sandra Newman
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Mehso-so

With Julia being one of my favorite novels of 2023 I had high hopes for The Men. Granted, while I found the idea intriguing, I knew it would take a decent amount of willing disbelief. That turned out to be less of an issue. What really keeps The Men from being anything other than a novel with a cool idea and some thought-provoking observations is its disjointedness. It goes in too many directions in a very small space and feels hollow by the end.

review
KarenUK
The Men | Sandra Newman
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Panpan

This maybe had ambitions of being the next Station Eleven, but ended up feeling flat and clunky. I didn‘t realize until finishing, that it has been surrounded by controversy with questions of transphobia and it‘s TERF agenda. I am not qualified to judge on this, but I felt that the ‘Y‘ chromosome extinction story was OFF in some way. What could have been interesting in the right hands, ended up feeling shallow and lacking any nuance or complexity.

squirrelbrain Ugh, oh well, another prompt ticked off though! 2y
squirrelbrain Hope you‘re OK over there Karen. I think you‘re East coast rather than West, but will you still get some effects from the hurricane? 2y
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KarenUK @squirrelbrain Aw thanks for thinking of me. Yes, I‘m east coast…… just Tropical storm and tornado warning for us today…. So everywhere is closed (so unexpected day off work!) as it‘s not safe in the roads. We had a couple of tornadoes last night near my house, and a ton of rain. But honestly we‘re getting off very lightly compared to the west coast…. 💕 2y
squirrelbrain Still sounds scary to me though, Karen. Stay safe indoors! 2y
BarbaraBB Thanks for the update. I‘ve been thinking of you too. Stay safe 🤍 2y
Cortg Stay safe! Bummer the book wasn‘t great. 2y
39 likes7 comments
review
AliD73
The Men | Sandra Newman
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Bailedbailed

Tired transphobic/homophobic clichés, ridiculous plot, and gratuitous violence in a novel that reads like it was hastily scribbled on a McDonald‘s napkin by a middle school student who‘s trying to pull up their failing grade in English by trying to impress their teacher with a thin veneer of pseudo intellectualism that just comes across as being laughable. I wish I could unread this. The instructions on my box of Tampax has more literary merit.

Chrissyreadit Your review! I literally pictured someone choosing between the book and tampon instructions 🤣 2y
AliD73 @Chrissyreadit I recommend the tampon instructions over this book. The quality of the writing is better and it will be a much more enriching and entertaining experience overall. 😀 2y
Chrissyreadit 😆🙌 2y
3 likes3 comments