The Water Cure
Books | Fiction / Psychological
3.1
(260)
Sophie Mackintosh
LONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF THE YEAR BY VOGUE, ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY, WASHINGTON POST, HUFFINGTON POST, VULTURE, LIT HUB, REFINERY29, and more. "A gripping, sinister fable!" —Margaret Atwood, via Twitter "Ingenious and incendiary." —The New Yorker The Handmaid's Tale meets The Virgin Suicides in this dystopic feminist revenge fantasy about three sisters on an isolated island, raised to fear men.King has tenderly staked out a territory for his wife and three daughters: Grace, Lia, and Sky. He has laid the barbed wire; he has anchored the buoys in the water; he has marked out a clear message: Do not enter. Or, viewed from another angle: Not safe to leave. Here women are protected from the chaos and violence of men on the mainland. The cultlike rituals and therapies they endure fortify them against the spreading toxicity of a degrading world. When their father, the only man they have ever seen, disappears, they retreat further inward until the day two strange men and a boy wash ashore. Over the span of one blisteringly hot week, a psychological cat-and-mouse game plays out. Sexual tensions and sibling rivalries flare as the sisters confront the amorphous threat the strangers represent. Can they survive the men? A haunting, riveting debut about our capacity for violence and the potency of female desire, The Water Cure both devastates and astonishes as it reflects our own world back at us.
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Author
Sophie Mackintosh
Pages
288
Publisher
National Geographic Books
Published Date
2019-01-08
ISBN
0735235341 9780735235342
Community ReviewsSee all
"wow wow wow - this book is so unsettling and beautiful ? very good read"
aub
"A little creepy, very atmospheric, but ultimately a bit disappointing. I wanted it to be more than it ended up being. Wanted the cult aspect to be further developed. "
Anne G
"I’ve seen so many mixed reviews online about this book. I loved it though. It’s lyrical and haunting with so much symbolism. It’s a hard read given the subject matter and if you’re sensitive to it but well worth it. I enjoyed this take on womanhood, family dynamics, trauma, and so much more. There’s a lot of depth to this novel. I hope more people give it a chance! "
G
Gen
"I wish there was a “meh” or in between button for the rating process on this app because this book is a great example of “perfectly mediocre”. Definitely not great, despite the attempts to impress in the writer’s tone and story telling, but also definitely not terrible. I kept waiting for the story to do something, and by the time it did, it was underwhelming and cliché. Not my worst read but not a top pick by any means. "
G h
Gillian holloway
"what if men were literally toxic?"
whiskyjay
"This book took me a while to get through. It was a bit dark, but has a great story."
B S
Bailey Szabo
"So deep, beautiful, & full of symbolism. The true meaning of the story depends on the reader's perspective. That being said, this book displays the plight of WOMAN. #feminist #dystopian #family #sisterhood #debutnovel"
Elsa Last
"Disturbing, odd, and deeply sad. Really interesting take on familial love and recovering from abuse. tws for child abuse, body horror, slight incestuous themes, and SA"
Megan Mishina Burke
"Weird but hard to put down. "
Shannon Aymes
