I wanted to like this book, and I think I was expecting something more in the true crime vein. Personally, I found the book extremely slow paced and I had trouble picking one woman from the other. Not for me. Perhaps if the reader was more invested in the religious doctrine it would be more engaging.

Women Talking by Miriam Toews isn't one of my average reading choices, but I'm actually quite interested in real life Mennonite and Amish culture, especially when it comes to Ohio and Pennsylvania. Needless to say that when I saw this novel on NetGalley it sounded like it could be right up my alley. I'm not all that familiar with Mennonite colonies in other countries or even the Low German dialect featured in the novel, but it was still fascinating to see on the page. The most disturbing thing about this story is easily the fact that it's based on a true story from events that occurred only a few years ago - let's just say that "violated" isn't the best word for the horrors these women endured at the hands of the men in their community. The title event occurred in 2011 and the violations happened between 2005-06, but honestly if you told me that it actually happened two or three hundred years ago instead I wouldn't have been surprised. My only complaint about this novel is the "meeting minutes" format - I've never seen any that look like what we see here.

I had a very difficult time finishing this book. The topic of Mennonite women being drugged and raped by their own community of men is shocking and fascinating, especially when I learned it is based on a real-life situation. However, the writing style is very confusing and difficult to understand. The women cannot read or write, so they ask a man who has been shunned by the men to attend their meetings and keep the minutes. He writes in a very informal fashion, describing so many women and so many situations that it is impossible to keep anyone or anything straight. I stuck with the reading only so I could see how it ends. I’m sorry that I can’t provide a more positive review. Thanks to NetGalley for providing a digital preprint.

In 2013, I read an article on Vice about 'the ghost rapes' of Bolivia. I was appalled, fascinated and horrified. Miriam Toews has taken this terrible story and written a very lightly fictionalized version. This is the story of the struggle of these women, to decide should they stay, fight or just leave.

This was....just okay. 1. The narrator is a man, which sure - these women were illiterate but, still. 2. Fact is always better than fiction. 3. This is The Handmaid's Tale starring Mennonite women.

I think that while the shock factor of the what actually happened are still horrifying to read, this could have been told as it actually happened, no need to fictionalize a real life horror story.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for the opportunity to read and review this book.

This book is based on a real-life event, which makes it all the more shocking. Between 2005 and 2009, hundreds of girls and women were raped by eight men from the Mennonite colony they were all part of. The men used an animal anesthetic to knock out their victims and then raped them. At first, the women didn’t know they had been raped but only that they would wake up in the morning feeling exhausted with their bodies bloody and beaten. They were told that ghosts or demons had done it as punishment for their sins or that they were lying or covering up adulterous affairs or that it was all in their imagination. Very young children were included in these rapes, as well as elderly women. Some of the women became pregnant. In 2011, the accused men were convicted. Even after the arrest of these eight men, the attacks still took place.

In Ms. Toews’ book, eight of the raped women meet in a hayloft to discuss what they should do to prevent themselves and their daughters from further harm. Should they stay and fight or should they leave? They had a window of opportunity as the men were off trying to raise money for the accused men’s bail. These women were never told how to read or write and knew nothing about reading a map or where they could go. They were told if they could not forgive these men, they could not enter the Kingdom of Heaven. So they had a lot to discuss. If a women whose 3-year-old child had been raped couldn’t forgive in her heart, wasn’t it a worse sin to say she forgave the men even if she didn’t mean it? The women in this community were just commodities to these men and had no say in anything. In reading this book, it was hard to believe that this happened in 2005-2009 and wasn’t something occurring centuries ago.

The author does such an excellent job of delving into the hearts and minds of these courageous women. I felt their fear and their heartache and their confusion as to what they should do to make their lives bearable. The suspense builds as the time for the men to return nears. In trying to decide what they should do, they have lengthy discussions about religion and faith. There were times they seemed to forget the urgency of their situation and lectured each other. There’s some humor in this book, despite its dark subject. It’s one of the most unique books I’ve ever read. Don’t expect much of a plot as the book is just what the title says it is – women talking. I think it was quite exceptional and destined to become a feminist classic. Not all readers will like the format of this book but the emotional depth of this story is just astounding.

Most highly recommended.

The premise of “Women Talking” is chilling. The women and girls of the Mennonite community of Molotschna have been repeatedly drugged and raped in their sleep by a group of their fathers, sons, and brothers. Although the criminals have been jailed, they are soon to return to the community, bailed out by their brothers.

The women are meeting to decide whether to stay or to leave the community. The everyday-ness of the women’s conversation is moving and identifiable. They talk, argue, hold petty grudges, support each other and laugh. And yet, running under the talk is the knowledge of the evil that undermines their community.

This is a moving and unforgettable story.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

This story is based on a true story, but it didn't really feel that way, as some parts just seemed far-fetched. There's a lot of talking in the book, so the title is appropriate, but things seemed to just go around and around, which made it hard to follow and keep straight at times. The premise was interesting, but the book itself was a bit boring for me, as there's just not enough action. Way too much narrative. I was excited to read it, but it just wasn't for me.

This was one of the most interesting and clever novels I've ever read. It isn't for everyone - not a lot happens and it is mostly talk (as the title so aptly describes). But the conversation and debate between the women is both ancient and modern in its content and struggles. While this is a group of women from a religious community that is stuck in the past (philosophically and geographically), their interactions and considerations are universal. Because of the religious background of these women, which Toews renders so unflinchingly and yet compassionately, the discussions may be more relatable to people with religious upbringing and familiarity with the Bible and with some of the more fundamentalist approaches to religion - though even without that knowledge, anyone interested in the psychology of groups would still connect with the text. This is not a page-turner, but a book that will make you think about your own motivations and what you might do when faced with tough decisions and consequences.

I received an advanced copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This book almost reads like a science fiction novel, like some distant cousin of A Handmaid's Tale, until you remember it is based on a true story. A sect of Mennonites live in a distant part of Bolivia, speaking their own language and rarely in contact with the outside world. When it's discovered that the women of the community were being drugged and raped by 8 of the men, the men are arrested and sent to prison in the city. While the rest of the men are away securing the release of the rapists, eight of the women meet to determine whether to fight or leave the community. The women are illiterate but desire to have minutes taken of their meeting. So August, the school teacher and only remaining man in the colony, is tasked with keeping their minutes.
The title is apt, because about the only thing that happens during this book is talking. It gets very bogged down, pretty quickly, as the women go back and forth, arguing their limited options. The arguments tend to be circular, as women change their positions repeatedly. I found it hard to relate to them as real people and it took me ages to be able to keep them straight in my head.
Here's how you know you're really not enjoying a book - when you find yourself repeatedly looking at your TBR queue wanting desperately to get to your next book. There were some passages that moved me, but not enough to draw me into the book. I felt this book was all about unrealized potential.
My thanks to netgalley and Bloomsbury Publishing for an advance copy of this book.

As a story that is for the most part about "just women talking," it doesn't have much action but that doesn't make it any less gripping. Though it got off to a slow start, once I gained my bearings, I was all in. I couldn't stop highlighting passages. Toews put together a truly powerful read that couldn't be more timely. It would make an excellent book club discussion.

This book is about a conversation between women, which is an imagined response to horrific real-life events occurring in a Mennonite colony in Bolivia. Between 2005 and 2009, women were waking up to discover that they had been drugged and raped. Originally attributed to demons, the attacks were finally linked with men from the colony who were arrested, tried, and imprisoned.

The premise of this book is interesting. The reality of this book is...boring. The women gather in the loft of a barn while the men are away to discuss their options after these attacks. They can do nothing, stay and fight, or leave. The entirety of this book is women debating and discussing these options through an account of the one man who has been asked to attend their meeting and take down the minutes. There *is* some interesting discussion about biblical doctrine, which is important because the women cannot read, and have only been told by the men in the colony how the Bible instructs women to behave.

The best part of the book for me was when we discover why this one man has been asked to take down the minutes even though the women cannot read.

And that is it. I considered giving up a few times, but kept thinking something else would happen. They talk. They make decisions, though not unanimously, and nothing else happens.

As a former victim of domestic violence and sexual assault, this book was a rough, but powerful, read for me. The author states that the story is loosely based on truth. Over a period of four years, more than 100 women and children were sexually assaulted in a Mennonite community in Bolivia. The victims were drugged with animal anesthetic and assaulted, waking the next morning bruised, bleeding, and in pain. Victims were led to believe that demons were attacking them because they were sinful. When the men responsible were arrested, the victims were accused of lying, expected to just forgive them and not seek justice, and assaults continued. Miriam Toews took her outrage over reports of the case and wrote this book.

The story builds using notes from secret meetings of the women. They are illiterate, so a trusted man attends the meetings to record the discussions. I was immediately sucked into the story. Thinking about a community of women kept illiterate, isolated, and without any decision making powers was disturbing. The thought that this sort of thing still happens in the world made me realize how spoiled, unaware and blind I am because of the relatively easy life I live. I am college educated. I am not abused on a daily basis. I make my own decisions. I have money at my disposal. My husband does not control my life. I'm treated as an equal. I can only imagine how these women felt.... They had to meet in secret to decide to stay in the life they knew, or leave and try to start over again somehow.

I felt so many emotions while reading this -- anger, fear, sadness. But it also made me realize how strong women are. When faced with an almost impossible situation, women will somehow find the strength to power through and go on. When faced with a horrific, abusive situation, these women met secretly to decide what to do. They supported each other and they did not falter. Bravery. Intelligence. Compassion.

I loved the plot of this book. I kept reading because I truly wanted to know what happened to these characters. But, the story moves slowly. Maybe the plodding feel is because it's reported through meeting notes? Most of the story is told through conversations. It made things tedious at times. But, I do see why the author chose the format. It works with the characters and the situation. They couldn't just make a decision and act on it. They were powerless. Conversation, planning and secrecy were required. Slow, methodical planning. They had to think it through. Their choices were do nothing and let things continue.....stay and fight for safety in their community.....or leave and learn to survive in the world outside the community. Big choices. Coming from a religious sect, they had to rethink their entire belief structure. Heavy stuff. And not something that can be decided quickly. My emotional response to this story might be because I knew from the start it was based on truth. If I had been reading this story solely based on its own merits, I might have been more frustrated by its slow pace.

I would have liked a lot less discussion of religious doctrine and a little more action, but the format (meeting notes) limited the exposition to conversations. The focus, at times, was on religion a bit too much, although I do recognize that the characters involved are part of a religious sect. I could see this book being great for discussion at a Christian women's group or book club. But the constant religious overtones put a damper on the story for me. It made me mad -- women subjugated, lied to, victimized, traumatized -- in a community that should have been safe had there not been extreme villainy and hypocrisy occurring. It took my attention off the subject of rape and abuse and turned it more towards my dislike of organized religion.

All in all, a powerful story about women. A bit too much religion for me, personally. But, I still enjoyed it. I'm giving this book a solid 3 stars.

**I voluntarily read an advanced readers copy of this book from Bloomsbury via NetGalley. All opinions expressed are entirely my own.**

I was interested in this book because it was said to be similar to The Handmaid's Tale which is taught widely in schools. This was not nearly as good. While there are parallels to be made, it was not as engaging and lacked the same depth for discussion.

This book was interesting, and I am not a religious person, but do know many Mennonites. I am not sure if this was an accurate/fair portrayal of the religion I'm very familiar with. However, this was an interesting read and I would recommend it.

I first heard about <b>Women Talking</b> from Russell on Ink and Paper blog. It is a story about a group of Mennonite women who come together after they discover that their nightly attacks have been committed by men that they call family and friend. While the other men have gone to bail out the perpetrators, the women have short time to decide their futures. They have three options on the table: to stay and do nothing, to stay and fight or to leave. It is not an easy decision as they live far removed from society. The women are illiterate and speak a language not known outside their community. To add to this their religion dictates that they must forgive and be forgiven in order to be accepted into heaven. These are not simple quandaries. With sparse prose and keen insight Toews explores their dilemma. <b>Women Talking</b> is a heart wrenching story yet a hopeful one as the oppressed come together to reclaim their power.

Where to start? This is a unique and tiny time capsule in the life of this group of Mennonite women. They have been trying to make up their minds about some decisions about their lives after months of having been drugged and sexually violated by male members of their patriarchal community. They have been dominated all their lives by men-forbidden to go to school or learn to read. They have no say in their community, but plenty to say amongst themselves.
Eight of the women meet over two evenings while the men are away and discuss their options. Should they leave, stay and acquiesce, or stay and fight the men. Their meetings make up the near entirety of the book. The conversations amongst themselves are lively and entertaining, but certainly the reality of disparate women unleashed to discuss a topic candidly. The one variable here is that they aren’t alone. They have enlisted the help of the male schoolteacher to take minutes which they have no ability to read.
I found the topic of this book interesting, yet in reality it didn’t live up to my expectations. The women were victims, yet some seemed willing to accept their role as pawns to the men in the community. They often came off as petty and self-righteous among themselves, and were constantly driven off track by minor irritations and random comments. I was surprised to find that I was more accepting of their indulgences as I read on. It was interesting how much I could get to know and appreciate the characters of these women just through these two evenings. I found myself caring about their choices and outcome by the end of the book after being more than a bit exasperated at the start.
The real wild card in this book was the character of August, the teacher, and his role as secretary for the women and narrator of the story. It is obvious that he has an affinity for one of the women that seems mutual. The other women either find him to be sympathetic or at least tolerable. Several times they ask him for his opinion or allow him to share a comment. Still, he is one of the men, and as such has no part in their decision. The author’s placement of him in this role seems a bit of a paradox.
Interestingly, this story is based on a real event. The author does seem to have a purpose behind her version the story. It made me think and will probably stay with me awhile. If for no other reason, I liked the book and would give it 3.5 stars.
I hesitate to recommend this title to everyone. I think it’s for a select audience of readers who enjoy books that make them look at things in a different way. It might work for certain book clubs, but will probably be a “did not finish” for many readers. I would suggest that anyone who gives it a try commit to persevering through to the end. You won’t find it to be a climactic one, but you won’t get the full flavor of the writing without finishing. It is absolutely not a book for action or thrill oriented readers!
My thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read and review this title.

I was excited to start this book. Firstly, because it has been favorably compared to another favorite of mine, The Handmaid’s Tale. (Although, to be frank, what book isn’t being compared to that nowadays, right?) It also has a very nice quote from Margaret Atwood herself, so I felt it important to read this book.

It is a fictionalized account based on a real events that occurred in a Mennonite colony in Bolivia a number of years ago. The book is a set of conversations. There is no real action, it is all talk. This screwed with my expectations a little. After that description I was expecting something to … happen I guess. Once I realized the book was going to be confined to this one meeting I tried to adjust my expectations and keep going. Unfortunately, it kept on in the same vein for its entirety. It is mostly philosophical debates among the woman in regards to the choice they need to make about how to deal with this situation and their religious beliefs. Here is where it lost me. I hate philosophy books. I took a class last year in philosophy and it was like torture. So this book did not work for me at all.

If you like philosophy, especially about religious doctrine, then this book will appeal to you. I don’t feel like the description did anything to promote the book. I was expecting a completely different book, and I was never able to fully divorce myself from my disappointment at not getting that story told. It’s too bad. I wanted to like this book. It’s just not for me.

This novel wasn’t for me, and I’m disappointed because I was really excited to read it. This story is based on a real-life event; women in a Mennonite colony in Bolivia were repeatedly drugged and raped by a group of men from their own community — and nothing was done to help them.

In an effort to defend themselves, the colony’s women gathered in a clandestine meeting to determine whether they should leave the colony, or stay. Based on the synopsis of this book, I was geared up for an empowering and feminist novel in which women debated the pros and cons of leaving or staying, and created a furtive but powerful plan to do either. I thought this novel was going to be an insightful retelling of these events from the point-of-view of a woman who lived in the colony. Instead, the novel was told through the point-of-view of a man — August — who was an excommunicated member of the colony, brought back to be a teacher (for the boys). August could read and write while the women in the colony could not, so they asked him to take the minutes of their meeting.

I believe that Toews’ use of a male narrator was to highlight the dependency of women in the colony on the male figures. I believe she was trying to portray for the reader just how misogynistic and patriarchal this colony is. Unfortunately – this didn’t work for me. I felt no attachment to August, I didn’t care about his backstory, and I thought his interjections into the women’s conversation were annoying and pompous. I really think that this novel would have worked better through the perspective of one of the women who lived through these attacks. August, obviously, was not one of the sexual assault victims, and as he was a character a degree removed from the actual attacks, I was a reader removed from the overarching issues at hand. I felt detached from the characters and the horrors they experienced.

Additionally, as this novel is about a community meeting, it’s heavy in dialogue, which is to be expected — but the conversations were so philosophical in nature that I quickly became bored, and hoped that the meeting would become more action oriented. Eventually it moved in that direction, but at that point I was tuned out.

Toews’ writing style is easy to follow, and she’s clearly a thoughtful writer with interesting ideas — but this one missed its mark for me.

A foreword at the beginning of Miriam Toews devastating and infuriating novel, Women Talking, explains that the plot is based on a true story. Between 2005 and 2009, hundreds of women in a Bolivian Mennonite community were drugged, abused, and raped. Eight men were eventually caught, tried, and sentenced for the crimes. Women Talking takes place over two days while some of the women hold a meeting to decide what they should do before their attackers return to the community while they are out on bail.

The novel is narrated by August Epps, who takes minutes for the meeting because all of the women and girls at the Molotschna community are illiterate. These women and girls have been through horrors and are still being victimized by the leaders (all men) of their colony. Over the course of the meeting, we learn that the Bolivian government only got involved because the bishop, Peters, was forced to call them in…to protect the accused from attacks by their victims. The men were only charged and jailed because it was safer for them. The women and girls have received no medical care except for some stolen animal antibiotics. All offers of counseling have been rejected by the bishop. Now, the women have been told that, in order to remain members of the colony, they must forgive their attackers and allow these men back into their community. If they cannot forgive, they will be excommunicated and exiles.

The meeting is called to decide what the women will do. Will they leave because they cannot forgive? Or will they stay and say they have forgiven their attackers? These questions are complicated by a host of issues the women have with their community and religion. At one point, they wonder if they are considered humans or animals by the men. At another point, they wonder about the state of their souls because so many of them cannot forgive and forget the way the Bishop and the other men (not the attackers) want them to. August adds some asides for context and his own views when the women ask what he thinks. These asides and tangents served to remind me that these women have been silenced in so many ways. They cannot even record their thoughts without a man to document them. No matter how sympathetic August may be, he still interprets, translates, and corrects what the women say; we don’t hear them directly.

Women Talking is a microcosm of so many things: misogyny, power and autonomy, language, faith, post-traumatic stress disorder, reconciliation and forgiveness, inequality, injustice, lack of empathy, repeated victimization, sexuality, recovery. This book may be impossible for some readers because of its contents and because it is based on real events. For readers who do take it on, it is a profound shout from women who are not truly heard by the men in their community, who are not believed by those men, and who may never see any kind of justice. My heart is still bleeding from what I read.

It has taken a few days for the impact of this story to fully hit me. The women in the story are meeting to decide their future after a horrific situation in which some of the men in their remote Mennonite village raped most of the women and even children in the village and then tried to make them believe it was the work of demons. The book takes place over two days, and through the conversations which ensue we get to know the women and their feelings about their situation. They have not been allowed to learn to read or write, they exist solely to serve their husbands and keep their houses, they have only two days before the men return and must decide if they should stay and do nothing or stay and fight or leave. None of these choices are easy and none of them seem even remotely possible. The fact that they actually manage to make a decision and begin to carry out a plan by the book’s end feels like a huge accomplishment. These women are talking about important things - religion and freedom and power and forgiveness - and their discussion is interrupted by the realities of their immediate lives - eating and feeding their children, taking care of their livestock, checking on the elderly in the village - we get to know these women and we are rooting for them to be able to make a decision which will move them toward a better life and some form of healing.