Jeanette Winterson

***LONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE 2019*** ‘Beware, for I am fearless and therefore powerful.’ Inspired by Mary Shelley’s gothic classic Frankenstein, discover this audacious new novel about the bodies we live in and the bodies we desire. In Brexit Britain, a young transgender doctor called Ry is falling in love – against their better judgement – with Victor Stein, a celebrated professor leading the public debate around AI. Meanwhile, Ron Lord, just divorced and living with Mum again, is set to make his fortune launching a new generation of sex dolls for lonely men everywhere. Across the Atlantic, in Phoenix, Arizona, a cryogenics facility houses dozens of bodies of men and women who are medically and legally dead... but waiting to return to life. With a bold contemporary take on the same dilemmas that concerned Shelley, Winterson explores what it means to be human in a funny and furious love story about life itself. ‘One of the most gifted writers working today’ New York Times

A Love Story

Frankissstein

rowanna 

Yet, I said to Shelley, you of all men believe in the soul. I do, he said; I believe it is each man's task to awaken his own soul. His soul is that part of him not subject to death and decay; that part of him made alive to truth and beauty. If he has no soul he is a brute. 

The loss was inside of me as I had been inside of her. I lost something of myself.

Byron is an atheist and does not believe in life after death. We are haunted by ourselves, he says, and that is enough for any man.

If time uses us as channels for the past - yes, that must be so, he said, as some people can speak to the dead.

And yet it is the language of our thoughts that tortures us more than any excess or deprivation of nature.

From internationally bestselling icon Jeanette Winterson comes her most highly anticipated new book since Why Be Happy When You Could be Normal?, about the bodies we live in and the bodies we desire

Lindy

Winterson covers a lot of the same ground from the same approach as she did in The Stone Gods, though I prefer this one slightly as the Frankenstein framing forces more focus. As in its inspiration, Frankissstein deals heavily with Cartesian mind-body dualism and the horror of embodiment. 

I'm slightly perplexed by people saying the book contains a inaccurate portrayal of a transgender man when the text doesn't support the idea that Ry is a transgender man. He never calls himself one; he does say that he's doesn't "think of [himself] as part of the binary" (155) and "not one thing, not one gender" (89). So if we're gonna throw labels around, perhaps "nonbinary" or "genderfluid" would make more sense? And would chart more with the character's thoughts and actions lol.

Jeanette winterson’ın zekasına anlam veremiyorum. Gerçeklik duygumu altüst ediyor. Geçmişle geleceği, gerçekle kurguyu birleştiriyor ve gerçekliği sorgulamamı sağlıyor. Bu kitap hakkında uzun bir inceleme okumak isterdim çünkü bitirince biten kitaplardan değil. Kafanda seninle birlikte bir süre daha yaşayan kitaplardan. 

Eylül Şimşek

Nicholas Barnard

exhilaratingly complex and poignant; can’t believe it didn’t win the booker

***LONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE 2019*** 'Beware, for I am fearless and therefore powerful.' Inspired by Mary Shelley's gothic classic Frankenstein, discover this audacious new novel about the bodies we live in and the bodies we desire. In Brexit Britain, a young transgender doctor called Ry is falling in love - against their better judgement - with Victor Stein, a celebrated professor leading the public debate around AI. Meanwhile, Ron Lord, just divorced and living with Mum again, is set to make his fortune launching a new generation of sex dolls for lonely men everywhere. Across the Atlantic, in Phoenix, Arizona, a cryogenics facility houses dozens of bodies of men and women who are medically and legally dead... but waiting to return to life. With a bold contemporary take on the same dilemmas that concerned Shelley, Winterson explores what it means to be human in a funny and furious love story about life itself. 'One of the most gifted writers working today' New York Times

Emily Perkovich

So, I have read Winterson before and had a bit of background on her because of this. I did take a break from this book to read quite a few author interviews, because portions gave me major TERF vibes which quickly made me uncomfortable. After reading the interviews, I feel like it’s safe to take this as an examination of the misunderstanding, as the author herself does not seem to hold these ideals (and if she does inwardly, she is at the very least doing a great job pretending that she doesn’t by vocally supporting the opposite. Which I say at face value. Not as it’s great to pretend! But as, she fooled me 🤷🏻‍♀️).

I think that it is important that anyone reading this not take these gender statements as what all (or possibly any) trans men feel about themselves being as it is written by a cis-queer woman. And just not in line with any rhetoric I have heard from actual trans people. But again, to me, at least after reading her personal thoughts, this read as more of a way to showcase the ignorance surrounding something so complex by using ignorant characters.

Amy Place

Katie Chua

I kind of want to give this 3 stars because i didn't really love it but i can't give jeanette winterson anything less than 4 stars, sorry i don't make the rules. 

this book is wacky and weird and definitely more ~experimental~ but it raised fascinating questions and topics like: the relationship with our physical bodies (automation, AI, and being trans), with creation (motherhood, being an artist, monsters, and robots). i thought it was smart that she used frankenstein to talk about recent stuff like robots and brains in jars, etc. 

damn i love jeanette winterson

nina

interesting ideas. boring execution. stop writing trans narratives that revolve around violence when YOU, the WRITER, are not trans please. it would've just felt like an eye-roll without the scene–english lecturers love to talk about being trans as if it's something humans don't do–but with it, extremely annoying.

Lauren 

** spoiler alert **
           Its just a bit odd, I feel like no story within this is finished. Its almost like each POV is just one long stretched out thought that doesn’t actually go anywhere. I feel like every single character is trying to be deep and philosophical but almost too much. Ron is the best brings everyone down to earth, just a business man proud of where hes from lol 

ALSO theres like one chapter where some fucked upness happens to the main character and then its just NEVER TOUCHED ON AGAIN like oops that happened but we dont need to think about that again !

Ammerins Moss-de Boer

farah farooq

Beth Bartholomew

Ditipriya Acharya

Molly M

Kyle Curry

From 'one of the most gifted writers working today' (New York Times) comes an audacious new novel about the bodies we live in and the bodies we desire In Brexit Britain, a young transgender doctor called Ry is falling in love - against their better judgement - with Victor Stein, a celebrated professor leading the public debate around AI. Meanwhile, Ron Lord, just divorced and living with Mum again, is set to make his fortune launching a new generation of sex dolls for lonely men everywhere. Across the Atlantic, in Phoenix, Arizona, a cryonics facility houses dozens of bodies of men and women who are medically and legally dead... but waiting to return to life. But the scene is set in 1816, when nineteen-year-old Mary Shelley writes a story about creating a non-biological life-form. 'Beware, for I am fearless and therefore powerful.' What will happen when homo sapiens is no longer the smartest being on the planet? Jeanette Winterson shows us how much closer we are to that future than we realise. Funny and furious, bold and clear-sighted, Frankissstein is a love story about life itself.

Jacqui

kate

Miguel Mateus

I am what i am, but what i am is not one thing, not one gender. I live with doubleness.

Frankissstein A Love Story

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