Spaghetti Head by Sarah Tyley ** Blog Tour Review**
Journalist Nell Greene is intelligent, beautiful and quirky – but a failure at relationships, thanks to her untrusting and disruptive inner voice. She has received The Award, and refusing to help repopulate the earth can seriously complicate your life: it is time for Nell to change. In a world where greed, war, and an environmental disaster have massively reduced the population, survivors have introduced a new system of governance - led by women but delivered by robots, and designed to promote peace and remove opportunities for abuse of power. Or at least that was the intention… Will Nell overcome the challenges of life in a post-apocalyptic world to find happiness, or will the System win?
Spaghetti Head is Sarah Tyley's debut novel that addresses issues of modern womanhood, environmental devastation and the impact of technological advances on our freedom, relationships and mental health.
My Thoughts
Spaghetti Head has some interesting things to say about relationships and the freedom to choose one's path in life. The world has been left the victim of an environmental disaster and a society has evolved which hardly dares to let mankind take the reins. A woman's right to choose when or indeed if, she wants to have a child seems to have been undermined totally. In fact, anyone exhibiting signs of thinking outside their proscribed role seems to be regarded with suspicion and distrust.
I particularly liked how the three generations' experiences are described. Nell's Grandmother and Mother remember times before the Disaster. All three generations seem to have taken different paths and are separated physically although technology keeps them connected. Personal contact does not seem to have the importance you would expect but they have retained a family feeling. Even so, in order to create a world where power cannot be misused, the System seems to have created a restricting and sterile sort of world.
Through Nell's exploration of her inner voice and memories, the author is able to explore issues of mental health and how we can feel easy in our own skin, even when the world outside feels rather cold and distant. I loved Alice, Nell's housebot who is programmed just for her and who she feels is her best friend. Everyone should have one.
In short: An interesting tale of individuals adrift in a post-apocalyptic world.
About the Author
I grew up on a dairy farm in Somerset and had a lovely
childhood running around outside, spending a lot of time surrounded by cows. I
would have to be biased towards Friesians, but really any cow will do - I love
them all.
I have written a diary since I was twelve, and some years
ago I thought to myself ‘hey, that must mean I’m a writer’ – and so I embarked
on short stories. I never quite got the hang of those so moved on to trying a
novel.
I currently live in France splitting my time between my
gardening business, writing, and playing tennis. I love Roger Federer almost as
much as I love cows.
Book link: Amazon UK
Thanks to Sarah and Anne Cater of Random Things Tours for a copy of the book and a place on the tour.
Be sure to check out the rest of the tour!
Paperback: 324 pages
Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform (4
May 2018)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1986751864
ISBN-13: 978-1986751865
Thanks for supporting the Blog Tour Pam x
ReplyDelete