MaddAddam (MaddAddam, #3) in Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge

Aug 15, 2013 Jeff Scott rated it liked it

Shelves: science-fiction, dystopia

Atwood’s final installment of the Oryx and Crake Trilogy is again a side-sequel only inching the original story along. We find out more about Zeb, one of the mysterious Gods Gardeners introduced in Year of the Flood. Through Zeb, Atwood again takes us through the nightmare dystopia of the world before the “waterless flood” where corrupt and greedy corporations pillage the environment and humanity. This is also a story of the Crakers, the new breed of human, a devolution of sorts created by Crake Atwood’s final installment of the Oryx and Crake Trilogy is again a side-sequel only inching the original story along. We find out more about Zeb, one of the mysterious Gods Gardeners introduced in Year of the Flood. Through Zeb, Atwood again takes us through the nightmare dystopia of the world before the “waterless flood” where corrupt and greedy corporations pillage the environment and humanity. This is also a story of the Crakers, the new breed of human, a devolution of sorts created by Crake in the original book. Toby, first introduced in Year of the Flood, becomes their Prometheus of sorts.

The original question at the end of Oryx and Crake was whether the Crakers can survive in this new world with terrible threats. Crakers are an animal version of humans, herbivores, and without sexual jealousy, Crake thought this would be a better way for humans to inhabit the Earth. He tries to wipe out the rest of humanity to ensure that they flourish. Toby’s role in their development is intriguing and pushes this experiment along. She and the remaining God’s Gardeners must make a new way in the world. Zeb also reveals his role in the waterless flood.

Of all the books, the first book is by far the best. Atwood creates this strange world, a scary and believable future. She then tears it apart for something new, it ends as a survivalists tale both for Jimmy and the Crakers. Oryx and Crake ends on a cliffhanger and I think it makes the story structure nearly perfect. However, she winds it back and adds layers to the story in The Year of The Flood. It was good to expand on this fascinating universe, but it came at the cost of deflating the cliffhanger and the message. MaddAddam further deflates that. It’s a meandering story that adds yet another layer and FINALLY gets back to a conclusion to the end of the first story, unsatisfactorily so. I liked what she did with the Craker storyline, very biblical, but there is too much back story she is trying to cram into the original storyline. It is also impossible to read this without reading the first two books. I had to go back and look over Year of the Flood to job my memory a few times. It becomes very tiresome and muddles the original message.

Favorite Parts

Amazing how quickly the past becomes idyllic. P30
Perfection exacts a price, but it's the imperfect who pay it. P. 36

“Why is war so much like a practical joke? She thinks. Hiding behind bushes, leaping out, with not much difference between Boo! And Bang! Except the blood. The loser falls over with a scream, followed with a foolish expression, mouth agape, eyes akimbo. Those old biblical kings, setting their feet on conquered necks, stringing up rival kings on trees, rejoicing in piles of heads—there was an element of childish glee in all of that. P. 40
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