Search - The Third Child

I'm a long-time fan of Piercy's work, but was very disappointed by this book. Trite, predicatable, cliched, with characters that are uninteresting, hollow stereotypes, there is little to recommend this novel. Perhaps if I had been 16 when I read this it would have been engrossing, but this is not a book for an adult audience. The primary character is unrealistically naive, and most readers will guess the plot complications before they happen. It's unfortunate that Piercy's normal political and human insights are so missing from this novel.

If you haven't yet read anything by Marge Piercy you are in for a treat. She is one of the greatest US writers. This book is a contemporary epic with intra family dynamics that have many repercussions.