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3/5 Snake bites

What is it about?

Two different girls find two different snakes in their bed and run away from the people who are out to hurt them. One is a young girl who hitches a ride with a caravan delivering oil to Ethiopia, and the other is a 27-year-old woman who decides to walk across “The Trail”. The Trail is a bridge made up of individual 1 meter platforms that span the Arabian Sea between India and Africa whose purpose is to convert waves into energy, and it is highly illegal to cross.

Was it good?

My husband asked me this as soon as I closed my kindle last night, and my immediate response was, “It was… strange”. There are two points of view that the story is told from. Meena, the young woman, tells her story in a stream of consciousness that makes you sure she’s probably at least a little crazy. Mariama, the young girl, tells her story to you, who she believes is Yemaya, a woman from her past.

The first 20% of the book is pretty confusing, and the middle portion of it verges on boring. The redeeming quality to this book is the big unexpected twists and reveals at the end. So if you read this book, hang in there because it’s worth finding out at the end.

Extra thoughts

This book is set in a not too distant future that is believable. I may have confused some of the cultural terms with future terms and vice versa as this book is also set in India and Africa, but I thought the future was very well portrayed. I love the idea of using the ocean’s energy to power our cities. I also find it very likely that we will all have a facebook type halo around us that people can use to identify us; if we choose to allow them the pleasure.