In my youth I tried to read Atwwod because as a young Canadian woman I felt it was my obligation to do so, but found her very difficult. I very much enjoyed this book however & didn't want to say good by to the characters. Very thought provoking & somewhat frightening. I will recommend this to those concerned with our environment and especially those who seem not to be.

The book is almost too timely with the recent outbreak of H1N1 - a thought-provoking story of a future we could actually be creating now. Solid foundation of facts laced with the possibilities of certain paths of human choice - from the ethics of gene-splicing to corporate power to life style choices. A book to entrall and entice for sure. Can't wait for her 3rd on with these characters. Does the human race survive? Only Margaret knows

Reason for Reading: Atwood's new book. Summary: A plague has wiped out the majority of the world and the God's Gardeners cult had been preparing for the end-times (the Waterless Flood) all along. Two women, who were members of God's Gardeners have survived the plague. One, Ren, because she was in an isolation unit (almost like an apartment) where she was recuperating after being abused by one of the patrons in the sex club where she worked and possibly contaminated. The other, Toby, had locked herself in the beauty spa (heavily secured corporation run) she was the manager of the night the plague hit full force. The story is told from three points of views. Ren's and Toby's with both of them telling their present situation and remembering their past life with the God's Gardener's. The third point of view comes from the past and follows the God's Gardeners year by year through sermons given by Adam One which end with a hymn. Comments: I really enjoyed Oryx and Crake and dived into this book as soon as it came into the library for me. The book was a quick read. I always find Atwood's writing to flow so naturally her books are often hard to put down, and this was no exception. Ren and Toby are full, realistic characters, quite opposite in nature from each other but both emotionally draw the reader into their lives and thus the book. Atwood's feminist side shows through here as we see a comparison between the two women. Ren has been treated kindly then thrown aside and later used and abused by men because of her good looks while Toby has been used and abused and later ignored by men because of her plain looks. The God's Gardeners cult was pretty creepy in my opinion. Atwood has created a religion which is Old Testament based, yet Pagan in nature and is full of Saint Days. While the group believes in an Old Testament God, they are eco friendly by worshipping animals and nature and are strictly vegan. Near the beginning she has a St. Mowat of the Wolves day and I said to myself, "Oh, Lord please do not let her have a St. David Suzuki day in here or I'm going to through this book across the room". He did appear, but fortunately it was near the end of the book and I held back my urge. I would suggest reading Oryx and Crake first. The books are not dependant on each other but this one does reference many things from the first book and you are going to wandering around in the dark as either no explanations, or only brief ones are given. A very quick explanation of the events of the first book are summed up for you at the crucial point in Year of the Flood but a reader will be missing out on a whole book's worth of insider information if they journey into this without having read Oryx and Crake first. Ultimately though, I was disappointed with book. It was a good enough book. Fans of Oryx and Crake will have to read it to find out the rest of the story. But I just didn't get into the story that much. It wasn't a page turner, even though it read quick enough. The plot kept moving forward but there never was any real suspense, reveals, moments of great emotion or climax even to satisfy. Well, there is a climax and an ending but they are small and weak and I ended the book with a "hmmph".

I didn't plan on reading this book at all...i'm not much of an Atwood fan. But there it was on the speed read shelf at the library, so i grabbed it. And for this reason i didn't know that "The Year of the Flood" was tied in with another Atwood book, "Oryx and Crake". I don't think it matters that i didn't know this, or that i didn't read "Oryx and Crake" first, as many reviews said would be in my best interest to do. Anyway...i wasn't sure if i would like this book...a quarter of the way in...and it got me. What seems simplicity is in reality the brilliant vision of Atwood in writing a book that raises our level of humanity to an all time high. Religion, politics, ethics...Atwood covers it all and makes you think...really think...about our role here on this planet. You see, feel, and act through the eyes of Toby and Ren...two survivors of the "flood". Atwood has this remarkable ability to capture the intricacies of relationships between women. I found myself questioning and thinking about a lot of things in life as i read this book. Glad i picked it up...though not sure if i'll go back and give other Atwood books a try.

In TYotF the reader is familiar with some of the events (same time and place as Oryx and Crake), but you see them occur from a different perspective. OaC was a solid 5 stars, it was shocking at times and made me think about it long after I read the book. Atwood is a great writer and this is a great novel but it just didn't resonate with me as much.

In 1972, Margaret Atwood published Survival: A Thematic Guide to Canadian Literature, in which she proposed that Canadian literature to that point had been based on the need to survive, whether against nature or against human opposition. Thirty-seven years later, Atwood has defended her thesis by making literal survival the entire goal of the characters in The Year of the Flood. We follow two main characters, Toby and Ren, who have managed to survive, by their isolation, the waterless flood, a plague affecting most human beings. However, to continue to survive, they need to get out of their safe houses and out into the dangerous, and possibly infected, world. Both Toby and Ren are equipped with superior survival skills because they had been members of God’s Gardeners, a religion devoted to lessening the effect that human beings have had on the Earth and their fellow creatures. We learn of the Gardeners’ lessons through flashbacks of the time that both women spent with the group, from the sermons of Adam One, the leader of God’s Gardeners, and from their hymns, the latter two interspersed between the chapters of the novel. Neither Toby nor Ren had entered the religion by her own choice. Toby was rescued by a group of God’s Gardeners as she was trying to flee from a psychopathically violent employer, who was keeping her as a sex slave. Ren arrived in the group as a child when her mother became involved with one of the charismatic members of the group. And neither woman left the group of her own accord, but each learned enough from God’s Gardeners to be able to endure her time in isolation and her struggle to last in the “Exfernal World”. There is much to admire in any Atwood novel, but The Year of the Flood demonstrates her exceptional ability to imagine, not only the dystopian world of the future, which she has done before, but also the language, the hymns and the religion of this future world, along with all the negative detritus of that era, which we can see evidence of in the world around us. Most chapters note the passing of time by the saints days of the Gardeners. A few are actual saints that we may know of, but Atwood’s inventions show her cleverness. The saints of the Gardeners are people who have noted the problems in our environment and urged action to improve the situation, like Saint Rachel Carson or Saint Dian Fossey the Martyr. My favourite is Saint Farley of the Wolves. She also demonstrates her inventiveness with the names of the hybrid animals of the future, such as the Mo’hairs, sheep who possess long glossy hair in a rainbow of colours, which are used for hair transplants. Unfortunately, those who do receive these transplants continue to smell of mutton in exchange for their luxurious locks. Also the hymns of God’s Gardeners feel true the nature of the group and take the form of typical church hymns. Apparently Atwood has assembled a group to perform them at her readings, as well as launching a website offering t-shirts and other items connected with the novel for sale. In A Handmaid’s Tale, Atwood’s best known dystopian novel, the leaders of the religion she created were the most powerful people in that society. They made the rules for others and broke those rules. They were the source of the problems. In The Year of the Flood, God’s Gardeners are a marginal group. At first, I thought that Atwood was mocking the Gardeners with her characteristic cynicism, but they turn out to be prophetic and skilful in the world that they must survive. Also at first I felt distanced from Toby and Ren and from their stories. I thought of how Atwood when interviewed always seems to maintain an ironic tone as if guarding her true self, and I felt that this type of protectiveness was keeping me from complete involvement with the main characters, such as I had felt in her previous novels. However, by the end, I was lost in the story of these characters and was left wanting more answers to the questions it raised. The Year of the Flood is a sequel to Oryx and Crake, another novel I enjoyed, and Atwood has promised a third volume to this trilogy, which may answer some of my questions. The characters of Oryx and Crake live in the same world as those of The Year of the Flood, and the time periods of the two novels are parallel. Eventually some of these characters spill into the newer novel. However, The Year of the Flood has gone much further in its examination of this world and is a superior work of the imagination. Six years passed between the publication of these two novels. I hope that we do not have to wait as long for the next volume of this impressive trilogy.

Having read Oryx and Crake in high school, I found myself carrying the story with me through my university years. I can't put my finger on it, but the characters and the world stuck in the back of my mind. Reading Year of the Flood (for class) was an unexpected treat, for I not only got to travel back in time to revisit this world, but I discovered this gem of a novel, which stands alone without the added riches of having read Oryx and Crake. Atwood's storytelling abilities are rewarding, yes, but what really surprised me was the uncharacteristic tenderness in the treatment of her characters, especially the God's Gardeners, which in less mature hands would have turned into a simplistic farce of religious beliefs, instead of the deeply complex and moving portrait that it was - while not buying into its system too much; the main characters themselves questioned their way of life. The story was fulfilling, the characters intricate, I had nearly no complaints about the book. I did think that it may have been unneccessary for Atwood to tell the reader what the source of the Flood was, described in Oryx and Crake, it may have been enough to keep the ambiguity up until the end. The other problematic element was the unlikely recurrence of the character Jimmy (the main character in Oryx and Crake) occured far too much for me to properly suspend my disbelief. I have a feeling that this novel will stay with me the way its precurser has, and the only thing that prevents me from giving this novel five stars is that the novel has only been published for only a mere set of weeks - I would like to see it pass the test of time. I bet it will.

At once terrifying, hilarious, and thought-provoking, 'The Year of the Flood' is Atwood at her best; a shockingly relevant cautionary tale, peppered with bursts of wry humour, and scenes so plausible they'll send chills down your spine; the perfect companion to 2003's 'Oryx and Crake', that other brilliant work of speculative fiction. One of the best books of 2009. A must-read.

I enjoy Margaret Atwood's perceptions of the future, and "The Year of the Flood" is another good book in the genre she does best. It focuses on the story of Ren and Toby, who survive the "Waterless Flood", a global pandemic that kills off much of mankind. It has the same feel as "Oryx and Crake", a book she published in 2003, and about 1/2 way into the book I realize that "The Year of the Flood" is indeed linked to "Oryx and Crake"! I will now have to dig up my copy of that book to remember how the story ends!