Margaret Attwood - Oryx & Crake

review by showhost
I read this book a few years ago and thought what a brilliant book it was. It was humourous, intelligent & a topic for discussion. I only read it because it was a book in our 'bookclub' and it was the first and only book of this author I have read.
It starts off quite odd but stick with it.
The world, Not as we know it (transgenics and cloning are every day sort of things. Society is divided between the poor, the pleeblands, and the rich, who live in compounds. Executions are shown on TV by the state, there are riots, food shortages), has been hit by an apocalypse and the human population just about destroyed.
Snowman (known as Jimmy in his youth) may be the last man on earth, his only pleasure the watching of old films on DVD.
Snowman is on the verge of starvation in this desolate new world, now living in a tree, for protection against mutant animals, pigoons, wolvogs, rakunks, roaming below him,
Jimmys father worked for OrganInc Farms, the company that created the pigoons - pigs designed to grow human organs for transplants. Ironic that Snowman is almost eaten alive by the hybrids his father created.
The climate has changed along with everything else, creating intense heat and sudden storms. Snowman's only protection from the elements consists of a pair of sunglasses with one lens missing.
In his tree top house Snowman is served by the Children of Crake or Crakers—strange human-like creatures. They bring Snowman food and consult him on matters beyond their understanding. Until the apocalypse the Crakers lived in the dome. They never had anybody speak to them so they never learnt to talk, never had clothes, they never saw any life outside their scientific environment. They are different colours, their thick skin is resistant to the damaging sunlight, they are polite, and unable to be violent or jealous. They also have a strange mating ritual (the female's backside changes colour when she is ready to mate, the male doesn't get excited until this happens. She can then have as many males as she likes! thus eradicating acts of rape).

His mind moves backwards and forwards through time, reliving his youth and early adulthood, which he shared with his best friend Crake then the events that led up to this catastrophe. As the book unfolds, we discover who Crake was, his link to Snowman, how his children came about and introduced to Oryx, the woman Jimmy loved
Gradually the reasons behind the disaster begin to unfold as Snowman undertakes a perilous journey to the remains of the bubble-dome complex where he lived with his father and mother.
It is a book about genetic engineering gone mad but we all know could be happening right now. The ideas and humour Attwood brings to the book made me laugh out loud at times: