The Power is a 2016 science fiction novel by the British writer Naomi Alderman. Its central premise is of women developing the ability to release electrical jolts from their fingers, which allows them to become the dominant sex. In 2017, it won the Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction.
Overview The Power is a book within a book: a manuscript of an imagined history of the tumultuous 21st century period – now 5,000 years in the past – during which womankind became the dominant gender after developing and sharing the power to emit electricity from their hands. The manuscript is submitted by Neil Adam Armon to another author named Naomi Alderman for an early read; it includes historical research aimed at filling in missing details leading up to the Cataclysm, in which one of the then-newly empowered females destroyed all modern technology. The manuscript author's name, Neil Adam Armon, is an anagram of Naomi Alderman.
Plot The Power opens with a letter from a male writer from the "Men Writer's Association," asking Naomi Alderman to read his historical novel. He gushes praise upon Alderman and thanks her profusely for her time. The novel follows four characters around the world as girls begin to demonstrate electrical powers. Roxy is an English daughter of a gangster whose mother is attacked. She manages to defend herself with the power, injuring one attacker, but another beats her up and kills her mother. Tunde is an aspiring male journalist in Nigeria who starts to film women using their emerging power and publishes it online. Margot is a mayor who discovers her daughter Jocelyn is developing the power. Allie is a foster child who kills her abusive foster father with her powers before taking refuge in a convent. The power is found to come from an electricity-generating organ, called the "skein", almost exclusively found in women. Margot and other older women gain the ability from younger women. The phenomenon is blamed on multiple causes, but hope that an antidote or cure will be found fades. Tunde's reputation allows him unique access to Saudi Arabia and elsewhere to document growing turmoil as revolutions take place. Allie, going by the name "Eve", discovers how to use her powers to heal. She becomes the leader of a reinterpreted, matriarchal religion movement. Roxy kills the man she believes responsible for her mother's death, and heads to America to lay low, meeting Eve and agreeing with her message of empowerment. Margot develops training camps for girls to use their powers, using approval of her proactive steps to respond to the crisis to launch a gubernatorial campaign. Margot uses her powers on her opponent in a debate, but the show of strength resonates with voters and she becomes governor, and later a senator. As formerly trafficked women in Moldova start paramilitary groups, Tatiana, the Moldovan president's wife, steps in to take over the country. After a military coup, she forms a pro-woman country called Bessapara in the south, while a rebel army funded by disempowered men opposes her in the north. Tunde is nearly raped while covering marauding women in India. Returning to England, Roxy begins trafficking a drug called "glitter" that enhances a woman's power. She learns that her mother's death was orchestrated by her father; she exiles him and takes over the criminal enterprise, with her brother Darrell as second-in-command. Eve takes her following to Bessapara, where she becomes a trusted adviser to Tatiana. Margot uses her senatorial influence and network of public-private girls training camps to develop soldiers to fight in Bessapara and other conflicts, while Roxy supplies the fighters with glitter. As the war rages on, Tatiana's rule becomes erratic and paranoid; she begins drastically curtailing men's civil rights. Rather than be expelled from the country like other journalists, Tunde decides to strike out on his own, sending his research and documentation to a trusted colleague, Nina, for safekeeping. He documents the increasing atrocities against men. Roxy is led into an ambush by Darrell, who transplants Roxy's skein onto himself. Roxy escapes and is believed dead, while Darrell takes over the glitter operation in Bessapara. Tunde tries to escape the country, but finds that he has been declared dead and Nina is passing off his journalistic work as her own. Tunde is captured but freed by Roxy, who agrees to get him out of the country. After the refugee camp they are staying in is attacked by rape gangs, they narrowly escape and form a bond of trust. Tunde is smuggled out of the country, while Roxy stays to try and retrieve her skein. Fearing that Tatiana's erratic behaviour threatens Bessapara, Eve uses her power to make Tatiana slit her throat in an apparent suicide and takes control of the country. Jocelyn, who is in the country as a private mercenary, suspects they are being given glitter, and sets out to find if her mother is involved in a drug ring. She is discovered by Darrell, who seriously injures her with his power, but is in turn ripped apart by the women under his command. Eve decides to continue the war, planning on embroiling the world in a devastating global conflict that will reset humanity back to the Stone Age, to rebuild under female hegemony; devastated by Jocelyn's injuries, Margot pushes the American president to back Bessapara, and the global cataclysm comes to pass. As a bookend, the influential author responds to the young male writer, telling him the book is a strong effort but found some of the details—such as male-dominated armies—far-fetched, and believes a man-dominated society would be more gentle. She suggests that he might find more success with the book if he publishes it under a female name.
Characters
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