There has been a good amount of female authored dystopian fiction lately concentrated on babies. Fertility appears to be a fertile subject. Certainly a relevant one in these days of increasingly terrifying politics, but still it seems so gender specific, maybe a case of write what you know or even write what you fear. Anyway, this is yet another one of those books and sadly not the best of the bunch. Particularly sadly since I seem to be the first person to review this one on GR. Mind you, this isn’t to flat out dis The Completionist, it’s a quite well written book with some interesting and original ideas, but it does have some detractors, the chief one being pacing. The bulk of the book (minus the flashbacks) actually takes place over a course of only several days, reading it shouldn’t feel like several days. Ok, I did read it in a day, but it moved slowly, partly due to the being overly detailed, partly due to repetition, partly due to just a deliberately exhaustively protracted narrative. The plot is essentially a young Marine returning from a war who sets off to find his sister, while also dealing with his other very pregnant sister’s impending nuptials and his strict disapproving father. What makes it stand out is that the story takes place in a future America devastated by natural disasters, deprived of water, with ravaged coasts and some cities in between rebuild and renamed New this or that, the story is set in New Chicago. There’s an ongoing decades long internecine war, the army in charge of protecting deliveries of engineered food and water are fighting those left outside of the new cities struggling to survive. And, of course, the baby crisis. Only 31000 births a year or so. Creating a correlated societal paradigm change…the relationships with low to no chance of procreation are deprioritized, so it’s s somewhat promiscuous world. The really interesting thing is that those who do managed by chance or design to get pregnant are treated…well, insanely. The women are essentially expected to sign their lives away and become functional incubators (sort of logical given the odds), while maintaining nearly impossible standards of care, strictly monitored and (this isn’t logical at all) restrictively financially punitive. Wait…what? So there’s a drastic shortage of babies being born with all the concordant ramifications (no future, etc.) and mothers to be are being fined? Fined? Punished? The wealthy can barely afford it, the others have to go as far as maim themselves for credits. Why wouldn’t the government encourage and support these babymamas? WTF? Unless this was meant to be a sort of social satire about the fact that US is the only first world country without proper paid maternity/paternity leaves, it just doesn’t add up. And it really doesn’t read as a satire either. It’s a pretty meticulously built world that frustratingly lacks rationality in its LEGO bricks. There’s also the fact that the disappeared sister mystery is dragged out so exasperatingly with only the tiniest nuggets of information dispersed…it becomes difficult to care. This is why I quit watching Glitch…pacing, everyone, pacing, don’t pose more questions that are answered. This book, particularly its stretched out dénouement, is much like a theatre play, without the inherent theatrical intimacy or immediacy. Just imagine watching a play where everyone narrated their thoughts out loud soliloquy style…it’s kinda like that. For a debut The Complitionist isn’t without a promise, it’s properly bleak for a dystopia, it showcases some genuinely good writing and imagination. There’s a chance it was too eerily prescient...reading about a country that seems determined to shoot itself in a foot and continue dancing. But the main emotion evoked for me was frustration, which probably isn’t what a book strives for with its audience. Who knows what this one might have been with a different editor, actually I’d be very interested to read other reviews of the book and/or author interviews to see some other takes or the behind the scenes thinking that went into this. This isn’t a sort of thing to eagerly recommend personally, but might very well be an acquired taste. Is there a subgenre for this yet? Baby fi? I’m still not sure why anyone wants to reproduce in a dystopia. It just doesn’t seem like an ideal place to bring life into. Then again everyone’s always been very unreasonable about procreation, so maybe that’s the moral right there. Something to think about anyway. Thanks Netgalley.