Rodham

*Spoilers in review* I preordered this book and really looked forward to it, but ultimately it was very disappointing. The first half of the novel, which mirrors Hillary Rodham Clintons actual life is fun to read- it was enjoyable to see her feelings about parts of her life imagined, and I enjoyed it for the same reason I like shows like The Crown. Its always interesting to imagine how people who have lead notable lives feel about it.

The second half of the novel is a giant mess. In rewriting Clintons history, Sittenfield has her make decisions completely at odds with who she is as a person. Erasing Carol Moseley Braun? Having Bill Clinton run against her for president and lead crowds in misogynistic chants forcing her to seek help from… Donald Trump?

Its so poorly thought through and doesnt make logical sense when you consider how misogyny, racism, and other forms of oppression actually work. I put the book down angry that Id wasted my time and my money on a book that missed the entire point of Clintons legacy of building coalitions of people with a goal of making things better, of making the impossible possible.

Id recommend skipping this if youre reading it to escape into a better world. This ones worse.

Full disclosure, I will read anything Curtis Sittenfeld writes. Since PREP, I have been an ardent fan of her books.

With RODHAM, Sittenfeld has really accomplished something remarkable: Who is Hillary without Bill? She hasn’t wholly rewritten history, but given Hillary her due. While also delving into the deeply disturbing hatred for Hillary by a large swath of middle class America.

The novel starts slow, but really picks up steam once Bill is out of the picture… I was reading late into the night hoping for a better outcome than the reality of 2016. This is an entertaining book… even if you are one of those folks who hate Hillary, you may come away from this book with a better understanding of her. This fictional account can certainly help one see her as a real person. In it, she is defined by her competence, rather than “-gate” after “-gate” after “-gate.”

Highly recommended!

I’m not a big fan of the real life Hillary Clinton, but I felt a real kinship with the Hillary Rodham at the center of the alternate reality presented in RODHAM. Curtis Sittenfeld does an amazing job of world building and detailing the intimate life of a narrator who never fails to sound like HRC. Even the most outlandish parts are plausible and the fictional take on stuff that actually did happen seems eerily right on the money. I started and finished this book on one day. I simply could not put it down. It’s just so evident that the author really did the work to make it both brilliant and believable.

This book is poorly written and unconvincing. It reads as if it were written by a high-schooler. The dialogue is stilted, the vocabulary hardly fits what we know of her two main characters, and the sex scenes are gratuitous and puerile. A talented writer could have done something clever with the premise of describing the different life paths of a fictional woman, based on the consequences of a key decision the woman makes. This story shows no cleverness beyond the initial premise and has no redeeming aspects that justify taking the liberty of re-imagining a real persons life.

A difficult premise to get right. Author went the trashy paperback romance route.

The first half is little more than the author detailing in the first person what she imagines it would be like to have sex with Bill Clinton.

There is a bit more substance as the book progresses, but still intermixed with gratuitous information, now about eldersex. Barely worth the read.

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