Katie's Reviews > The Blueprint

I don’t know if I will be able to convey how truly affected I am by this debut novel. From the first word, I was dragged in to a world scarily like our own (perhaps it could have been with a shift in political trajectory half a century ago). The reader is exposed to the hypocrisies and machinations of a government that has no qualms subjugating the “weaker” of society, justifying it as a way to protect and to guide those who wouldn’t otherwise be able to make decisions independently.

Our protagonist Solenne Bonet is at the complete mercy and whims of Bastien Martin, and the reader has the privilege of following her throughout the book; her thoughts, emotions, and sense of self are not her own and it becomes even more apparent as the novel progresses how she struggles with that. As the title suggests Sol uses her ancestor’s life as a guiding beacon for her own experiences in slavery and servitude. The fact that Rashad uses actual historical precedence as the basis for the overall plot is terrifying. It certainly isn’t something taught in US History classes.

The subtlety and pacing with which Rashad writes is what I found most shocking to me; Rashad does not use exposition to set the stage but rather she slowly unveils the horrors of living in a society where Black women and girls are property controlled by algorithms and software. I was still making realizations of the society nearly 80% through, just as horrified as the first time I realized her fictional society is far closer to the reality the US has today.

Rashad does an incredible job exploring the complexities of human thought, sense of self, autonomy (or lack thereof), and relationships – both platonic and romantic. Her understanding of abuses, not just physical, was heartbreaking to experience first-hand simply because of how well she presented it. Rashad has an amazing understanding on the human condition, and does even better conveying it in her novel.

I’m new to dystopian literature, and this was one heck of a book to start out with. It deserves every star it received, and I will certainly be watching out for her next book.

I won this in a Goodreads Giveaway.