Braided Lives

Marge Piercy's writings are about human values. She's not an alienated, too sophisticated, befuddled, philosophically complex writer who writes to communicate angst and befuddlement at the world. Marge Piercy's writings are about human values and how those values came through to move people forward starting in the struggles of women, of Blacks, of young people against the war in the 1960s. This is a book that I read every year or so since I first got it about 20 years ago. It is a book that I particularly find myself rereading when I feel overrun or perplexed or hit by disaster. I think I find such strength in this book because this is the story of someone who fought for their own identity out of the working class life of growing up in the 1950s, out of fighting for a women's place in the middle of sexism and male domination of academic life in the early 1960s. I think this is a book about the realization of the self by shedding what dead traditions that stood in our way in those times. While she is a delicate, precise sculptor with words in poetry, Piercy is never one to make the words in her prose get in the way of putting down a clear story. I hope you will find this book adds to your life the way it has added to mine. If you like this try her Small Changes.

It is very easy to group all women writers into one category, especially in the UK where it seems that every woman is a twenty-something writer of tales of lost boyfriends and work stress. Marge Piercy is a world class above these writers, depite the dodgy publiscist she has who gives all her novels terrible covers! This book is an enticing tale of women surviving in a society that does not hand them anything. It's a sobering tale for those of us who feel we have a relatively firm grasp on our lives/careers in this new millenium. Spend some time thinking about the struggle women face on the most basic level day in day out and try not to cry during 'that bit'!

Like one of the other reviewers, I have reread this book at least once a year since it was first published in the UK in 1984. Unbelievably, it is no longer in print there. Marge Piercy has created the most believable fictional world I have ever read - in part I suspect because Braided Lives is fairly autobiographical - and her memoir "Sleeping with Cats" confirms this (also a great read). I learn something new every time I read the book. Jill, the main character, is rounded, complex, politically aware and self-sufficient. I wish I could write as well as Marge Piercy to urge every woman to buy and read this book - I know my life would have been poorer without reading it. It really is that good.

This book is one of my top 3 favorites, along with two novels by Margaret Atwood (and what writer wouldn't want to be grouped with Atwood?) I was a sophomore in high school the first time I read Braided Lives and have read it perhaps 5 or 6 times in the ensuing 15 years. Although the prose seems at times a little overblown, this book throbs with emotion, and with each read-through I experience new depths to the story of Jill and her friend Donna. This novel went a long way toward developing my own political sensibilities, for which I'd like to thank Marge Piercy. Her characters, settings, and themes remain as vivid in my mind as if I'd lived this story myself.Highly, highly recommend!

Marge Piercy's writing style is unlike anything I have ever read before. Her writing is pure poetry. It gathers around you like a warm, comfortable quilt from page one and draws you into a world of the past that is both fascinating and easy to identify with. Her characters are masterfully created and expressed, and this slice-of-life novel is one I will definitely read again! If you are into cheap romance or soap-opera-like plots, this novel is NOT for you. This novel is real and alive. If you enjoy quality literature, then BUY this book!