Frankissstein

A Love Story

by Jeanette Winterson

Paperback, 346 pages

English language

Published 2019 by Jonathan Cape.

ISBN:: 978-1-78733-141-9

(11 reviews)

In Brexit Britain, a young transgender doctor called Ry is falling in love – against their better judgement – with Victor Stein, a celebrated professor leading the public debate around AI.

Meanwhile, Ron Lord, just divorced and living with Mum again, is set to make his fortune launching a new generation of sex dolls for lonely men everywhere.

Across the Atlantic, in Phoenix, Arizona, a cryonics facility houses dozens of bodies of men and women who are medically and legally dead… but waiting to return to life.

But the scene is set in 1816, when nineteen-year-old Mary Shelley writes a story about creating a non-biological life-form. ‘Beware, for I am fearless and therefore powerful.'

What will happen when homo sapiens is no longer the smartest being on the planet? Jeanette Winterson shows us how much closer we are to that future than we realise. Funny and furious, bold and clear-sighted, …

In Brexit Britain, a young transgender doctor called Ry is falling in love – against their better judgement – with Victor Stein, a celebrated professor leading the public debate around AI.

Meanwhile, Ron Lord, just divorced and living with Mum again, is set to make his fortune launching a new generation of sex dolls for lonely men everywhere.

Across the Atlantic, in Phoenix, Arizona, a cryonics facility houses dozens of bodies of men and women who are medically and legally dead… but waiting to return to life.

But the scene is set in 1816, when nineteen-year-old Mary Shelley writes a story about creating a non-biological life-form. ‘Beware, for I am fearless and therefore powerful.'

3 editions

anaulin reviewed Frankissstein by Jeanette Winterson

Review of 'Frankissstein' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

My notes: anaulin.org/blog/book-notes-frankissstein/

Lieke reviewed Frankissstein by Jeanette Winterson

Review of 'Frankissstein' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

Overall I loved reading this book: the essential questions about the future of AI, the fictionalised history of Mary Shelley, the jokes which occasionally made me laugh out loud.
But one thing made me really uncomfortable: can a cis gendered author write a respectful story about a trans person? I can see why Ry is trans, but I can also see his character would be highly offensive for a lot of trans people, including some harmful passages.
Furthermore, it came to my attention that Winterson would prefer trans teens not to get the healthcare they need (www.reuters.com/article/us-britain-lgbt-books/no-rush-to-change-gender-uk-writer-joins-trans-debate-idUSKCN1T028R). Her writing about trans experiences is highly problematic if she has this view.

lex reviewed Frankissstein by Jeanette Winterson

Review of 'Frankissstein' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

A playful celebration of Frankenstein and Winterson taking on the past, present and possible future of A.I. There's not much emotional depth here but it's fun and thought engaging.

Adrián Astur Álvarez reviewed Frankissstein by Jeanette Winterson

Review of 'Frankissstein' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

Winterson has the ability to weave a tapestry of ideas across time and distance wo suffering from an overload of plot points. I'm not sure how she does it but I'm in awe. In the case of this narrative, though the ideas were largely abstract, somehow they took on an emotional weight, which built steadily, so that by the end of the novel I was altered - mostly depressed and sad, honestly.

This book has such a provocative concept it is carried along solely by the power of its ideas in context. I'm not sure it would withstand multiple readings but it's probably well worth finding out.