Frankissstein by Jeanette Winterson

I received an ARC of this book thanks to Net Galley and publisher Grove Press in exchange for an honest review.

Oh boy, where to start with this book. I have labelled it a 'DNF' but I did actually pretty much read all of it, I just wanted to DNF it so many times. I requested this book after reading an excerpt and I'm ashamed to say I wish I hadn't. The unusual writing style caught my eye and I thought the plot had huge potential. This is kind of a futuristic retelling of Frankenstein based around sex bots and AI? Honestly I don't know what was going on with this book. The plot became really hard to follow due to the writing style and there were flashback chapters to Mary Shelley which just made me confused and bored. There is however a much bigger problem with this book.

It's transphobic. Very transphobic.

Initially I was excited to read about a trans doctor as the protagonist. Unfortunately the language surrounding the discussion of this character is rife with unfortunate implications. Ry frequently describes himself as now identifying as a man (Ry is a female-to-male trans character) but then explains that he is a hybrid and still a woman and not a real man and aaaaah. Gender fluidity is absolutely a thing and I would happily read about a gender fluid character but this is done all wrong if that's what the author was going for.

This trans character is also specifically fetishised for being a 'hybrid' by his male doctor partner. There is a lot of discussion about genitals etc and this was extremely uncomfortable to read about. I really think more research should have been done because I found this book incredibly problematic so I can't imagine how it would read to a trans audience (Although I did float a few of the problematic things past my trans friends to check I wasn't being unfair. They all agreed that this sounded AWFUL).

Terrible transphobia aside, this book is just super dull. I did skimread until the end and at 80% through, nothing had really happened yet. It's such a shame because I could have really gotten into this book but ultimately, it felt like it was trying too hard to be literary.

Overall Rating: