Name: Poor Things
Rating: 4.015 (50 reviews)

Alasdair Gray

Set in and around Glasgow and the Meditteranean in the early 1880s, this unusual novel describes the love lives of two Scottish doctors and a 25-year-old woman who has been created from human remains by one of them. Winner of the 1992 Whitbread Award and the Guardian Fiction Prize. Illustrations.

Episodes from the Early Life of Archibald McCandless M.D., Scottish Public Health Officer

Poor Things

Soon to Be a Major Film

Hello to everyone else who is reading this after having seen the film. I hope you were as pleasantly surprised as I was.

This a quite layered and complex humorous novel. It is a - somewhat - successful commentary on female bodily autonomy and misogyny, as well as capitalist society. It is every explicitly political which is refreshing - a sad statement, given that this is what a novel like this is supposed to be in the first place. It manages to pack quite a bit within its short page count and I can only imagine how much more fun it would be to unpick in a reading group.

Hello to everyone else who is reading this after having seen the film. I hope you were as pleasantly surprised as I was.

This a quite layered and complex humorous novel. It is a - somewhat - successful commentary on female bodily autonomy and misogyny, as well as capitalist society. It is every explicitly political which is refreshing - a sad statement, given that this is what a novel like this is supposed to be in the first place. It manages to pack quite a bit within its short page count and I can only imagine how much more fun it would be to unpick in a reading group.

What strange secret made rich, beautiful, tempestuous Bella Baxter irresistible to the poor Scottish medical student Archie McCandless? Was it her mysterious origin in the home of his monstrous friend Godwin Baxter, the genius whose voice could perforate eardrums? This story of true love and scientific daring whirls the reader from the private operating-theatres of late-Victorian Glasgow through aristocratic casinos, low-life Alexandria and a Parisian bordello, reaching an interrupted climax in a Scottish church.

Princess Doe 

Ryan Mateyk

One of the most, if not the most, creatively and wisely crafted books I’ve ever read. Such a fun unique take on Victorian sensationalism. Excited to see the big screen adaptation!

What a strange and incredible book. I loved it. 

Rebecca Harwood

An excellent read. Takes ideas from other books and masterfully uses them to create an original story about what it means to be a woman who aspires to be free and love whoever she wants. 

Lorenzo Barretta

An excellent read. Takes ideas from other books and masterfully uses them to create an original story about what it means to be a woman who aspires to be free and love whoever she wants. 

Highly recommended.

A book set within its own book, footnotes, acknowledgements, amazing build up of fiction that seemed rather edging on true life. Amazing how I had never heard of this book if it werent for Yorgos Lanthimos so thank you Alasdair Gray for this exquisite yet at times comedic journey, and thank you Yorgos for helping put up visual characters in my brain.

diya

the first book i have read and completed in 2024, it is one that reminds me of how for centuries, not much has change. still men thinks they can dictate what is to be of the world, how those in power still think inferior of others who are also human beings. how cruel humanity is. and how we are all poor things. 

Poor Things Episodes from the Early Life of Archibald McCandless M.D., Scottish Public Health Officer

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