THE POWER by Naomi Alderman

The premise of this novel is fascinating; unfortunately, the novel itself is not.  The premise is that a genetic mutation gives women a skein of electrical power alongside their collarbone.  This anatomical gift allows them to do essentially what electric eels do:  deliver an electric shock to their victims.  In this case, most of the victims are men, so that a mind-bending flip of gender inequality is in progress.  The women are now able to take over the world by wielding this new-found power.  Again, the premise is very thought-provoking, but the novel is very disjointed and bounces around between narrators and venues.  The narrators are Margot, an ambitious politician; Jocelyn, Margot’s daughter, who has a deformity in her skein; Allie, an abused foster child who starts a religious sect; Roxy, who possesses great physical power but whose family I could not quite figure out; and Tunde, a male Nigerian photo-journalist.  The book basically takes the position that if women ruled the world, we might be in even bigger trouble than we are now.  Many of the women are cruel to an unimaginable degree and things get wildly out of hand.  Do the women commit acts of atrocity in rebellion against their previous second-rate citizenship, or are they just drunk on power and do horrible things because they can?  Maybe the author explains their motivation, but I just didn’t get it.  Lastly, the author frames the book as a manuscript of a historical novel written 5000 years in the future.  What?  Now, that’s a long time to project that we still have books.