Charlotte Wood’s latest novel The Natural Way of Things almost made
it onto my list of Books I Meant to Read in 2015. It’s now on my list of Books I Most Enjoyed Reading in 2015.
Ten young women awake after being drugged and kidnapped, to find themselves prisoners at a remote property somewhere in rural Australia, corralled behind a high electric fence. From the second they arrive they are systematically de-humanized; Shorn of their hair like the sheep that once occupied the run-down sheds, forced to wear old-fashioned Amish style clothing, leashed together, deprived of the most basic sanitation. And all the time subject to misogynistic rants and abuse by two enforcers the brutish Boncer and Teddy the narcissistic yoga addict.
The girls have little in common except that they have been the subject of