Oryx and Crake (no big spoilers for once, I promise)

I am taking a class entitled Environmental Literature, and one of the books we'll be reading is The Year of the Flood, by Margaret Atwood. Since it's the second in her MaddAddam trilogy, our teacher recommended we read the first book, Oryx and Crake. So I did. I just finished it, and thought I'd share my thoughts here.

Oryx and Crake starts out pretty slow. To be honest, I didn't like much of the present-day action at first, since it was pretty dull and I was still waiting on the explanation. But over time it grew on me, especially once the flashbacks got underway. The character Crake was definitely the most interesting to me...or rather, I enjoyed seeing the differences between him and Jimmy. The way society "degrades" in this novel is very realistic, though I doubt it will actually happen this way. I enjoyed seeing people being more open to stuff that's taboo today.

I can't say that I liked Oryx quite as much. Her backstory was interesting, sure, but she only gets into the linear story of the flashback near the end. Once there, the pieces start coming together, but I still feel like she could have been developed a bit more. Or maybe I'm just like Jimmy, and want to figure out more things about her past in order to understand her, when that isn't important to her at all.

Overall, it has great pacing, though it drags at times. Once you make it through the first few present-day parts, though, it doesn't annoy you as much. Even though I didn't like that at first, I think this back-and-forth method was the right choice. I feel like this novel could have worked as a stand-alone, so I'm skeptical about the sequel. But maybe I'll be surprised.

Rating: 7/10

(I will rate books here by a ten-point system, which is my favorite by far. I rate stuff on Shelfari all the time, but I hate the five-star system. I like being more exacting in my measurements.)