Maggie's Dream - Leslie Tall Manning - ★★★★.¼

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AUTHOR: Leslie Tall Manning
GENRE: Historical Fantasy.
PUBLICATION DATE: September 1, 2017
RATING: 4.25 stars.


What a weird, wacky, wonderful book! Usually when you call a book weird or wacky, it would be taken as a criticism. But I'm sure the author would agree with me that in this case, it is more of a compliment. 😁

Every wonder what happened to all those ladies whose lifestyles drastically changed during the war? They entered factories, supported their country and their men, and after the war, were forced to return to their earlier lives where they had to step into the role of being a Stepford wife again. No doubt some of them would have broken under the pressure. Maggie, the eponymous lead character of this book, is one of them.

The book starts off routinely but soon detours into a different world altogether. There is a perfect medley of real life and the dreamscape, which gets more and more bizarre with every subsequent chapter. The plot twist at the end is fabulous. I couldn't figure out where the story was going with all those dreams but at the end, it did seem to make almost complete sense. (You'll know why I'm saying "almost" once you read the book. It isn't an easy book to process!😅)

Leslie Tall Manning makes effective use of the feminist thinking and psychoanalytic breakthroughs of the 1940s-1950s and creates a story that is unlike anything else I've read in this genre. Kudos to her imagination! Making a fantastical world in the Fantasy or Horror genres is one thing; to make a captivating alternate world within historical fiction is a whole different game. Not to mention that the historical fiction soon converts into a psychological thriller.

I really hated the three main male characters who seemed to have a major masculine superiority complex. The male characters in the book are thus pretty irritating but I suppose their actions make sense in context of the story and the timeline. Maggie is a strong lead female character and I felt sorry for her, especially at the end. You can identify with most of her struggles in the book.

The only little complaint I would make is that the book becomes a bit too drawn out in the middle. The start is fabulous, the end is fabulous. The middle could have been crisper in order to maintain the pace of the overall story. Other than this teeny complaint, I enjoyed this engrossing book!

I received an advance review copy of the book for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

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