BOOK 229: THE MARS ROOM: RACHEL KUSHNER

It’s 2003 and Romy Hall is at the start of two consecutive life sentences at Stanville Women’s Correctional Facility, deep in California’s Central Valley. Outside is the world from which she has been severed: the San Francisco of her youth and her young son, Jackson. Inside is a new reality: thousands of women hustling for the bare essentials needed to survive; the bluffing and pageantry and casual acts of violence by guards and prisoners alike; and the deadpan absurdities of institutional living, which Kushner evokes with great humor and precision.

(Text from goodreads.com)

MY VERDICT: I really wanted to like this book, the subject matter and the whole idea behind it seemed to be right up my alley. But I didn’t enjoy reading it. I can’t put my finger on what it was about it that I didn’t enjoy. I found it to be a bit jumbled, it didn’t keep me hooked, I didn’t connect with the character, or any character and it was overall just okay.

Get this here…