The 305 Greatest Books - #182: Wise Children by Angela Carter

 The next up on my reading of the 305 greatest books is Wise Children by Angela Carter. The book can be found on the Observer Book List. 

I went into this book expecting a nice short read and got something I definitely wasn't expecting. The story follows the interpersonal familial relationships of Dora Chance, twin sister to Nora and child of another set of twins, Melchior and Peregrine Hazard. The question of which twin they are the children of is up for discussion during the text and becomes one of the major plot points. But that is not all, the story generally follows the lives of Nora and Dora through Dora's recollections as she thinks back on her life. While we are traveling through her life we also get hoards of other family jumping in and out of the story. To the point that I was very lost as to who was who and how everyone was related. I did find a family tree online after the fact, and there was a dramatis persona at the end of the book (because everything in it is a huge spoiler for the book), and while the dramatis persona helped, the family tree would have helped me much much more. The story though bounces around quite a bit, making it difficult to follow who is who and what their relationship is in everything. Add into all of that that the author doesn't always spell out who is who, or waits to do it. So sometimes the reader is just left wondering if they missed something. For instance, a main character is just identified as "Wheelchair" for a good chunk of the book but takes forever to tell us who she actually is. I noticed online that this book is noted for it's open feminism and support of the women's liberation movement and that is a definite plus in my eye, however this book definitely has one major flaw that is insurmountable for me to get past. And that is the raging incest throughout the book. While some interfamilial relations were frowned upon in the book (rightfully so), others such as cousins and niece-uncle were not only not frowned upon but celebrated in the end. It became overly much. There was also comments about slaughtering a pet pig and eating it after the owner died that pushed me over the edge. And so while I feel it has some strengths to it, I can't recommend it for many reasons.