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Cat's Eye | 
 enlarge | Author: Margaret Atwood
Publisher: Virago Press Ltd
Category: Book
List Price: £7.99
Buy Used: £0.01
You Save: £7.98 (100%)
New (29) Used (115) Collectible (1) from £0.01
Rating:  22 reviews
Sales Rank: 6714
Media: Paperback
Edition: New edition
Pages: 432
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 7.6 x 4.9 x 1.2
ISBN: 1853811262
EAN: 9781853811265
ASIN: 1853811262
Publication Date: April 14, 1994
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: Nice clean reading copy
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Amazon.co.uk Review
Margaret Atwood charts the psychological process of memory as compulsion and memory as a healing act through the character of Elaine Risley, an artist who returns to her home town of Toronto for a retrospective of her work. Elaine's visit triggers thoughts of her childhood with all the urgency of a bad rash. Dominating her reflections are her childhood "friends", three girls who wreak havoc on Elaine's self-esteem. Having spent her early childhood on the road with an entomologist father, a less than traditional mother and a brother more concerned with snot and snakes than the intricate behaviour codes of girls, the young Elaine is vulnerable to the indirect aggression of Cordelia, the ringleader of the group who seeks to improve her. Through Elaine's experiences, Margaret Atwood turns a keen and ironic eye on the training of females in North American culture: "All I have to do is sit on the floor and cut frying pans out of the Eaton's Catalogue with embroidery scissors, and say I've done it badly." The self-effacement of these girl-children barely masks a need for power that erupts all too often in cruel forms of play. This is a story in which the lines between victims and oppressors blur, in which forgiveness becomes an act of gaining power. Through humour, pain and insight, she makes us see, with surprise and recognition, details from childhood we may well have forgotten. --Chris Kellett, From 500 Great Books by Women
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| Customer Reviews: Read 17 more reviews...
 The agony of girlhood - dissected with a scalpel January 16, 2008
Book Groupie (Warwickshire)
Margaret Atwood turns her lucid prose to the experience of a young girl being coerced and bullied by her "best friend" - or is the victim complicit in some way? A painful analysis of the way that children and young women exercise pressure on each other under the guise of friendship.
But it's strangely enjoyable.
 Spot on September 1, 2007
theshortmad1wivmessyhair (essex, england)
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
`Cat's Eye' is the story of Elaine Risley, a painter who returns to Toronto for a retrospect of her work and finds herself flooded by memories of her past. Probably the first half of the novel focuses on Elaine's childhood, especially the complex relationship with her `friend' Cordelia, while roughly the second half shows her growing up and coping with the difficulties of more adult relationships.
`Cat's Eye' captures the pieces of childhood, and especially the complicated power games that girls play with each other, absolutely perfectly. While reading moments of my own past came back to be, rather like the older Elaine holding her marble and suddenly remembering a past she'd forgotten (if not put behind her) such a long time ago. Never before have I read a book that truly illustrates how subtle and nasty little girls really can be while in a believable and realistic context.
If I have a criticism it's that I enjoyed the early parts of the novel far more than the later when Elaine was older, however, being eighteen, it may only be that I was able to identify with the earlier incidents far more than troubled marriages and in twenty years I may feel differently.
Overall a hugely enjoyable book that really seems to chart how women act towards one another. Perhaps it wouldn't mean quite so much to men but I think many women would recognise moments and behaviour in this interesting and absorbing novel.
I've read a number of Margaret Atwood novels and short stories and while the writing possibly isn't as well done as `The Handmaid's Tale' it's still up there with the best. A must if you're a fan, probably a good place to start if it's your first.
One of my all time top ten books May 28, 2007
lilysmum (uk)
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
by one of my all time top ten writers. Just brilliant. You don't notice you're even reading because you're so caught up in the fiction. Wonderful.
Thought provoking... brilliant. February 11, 2007
Heather (Leeds, Yorkshire)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Cat's Eye was the first Atwood novel i read and i can definitely say that it got me hooked! (I am currently reading it for the second time.)
Atwood has one of the most unique and brilliant writing styles that i have read and i think this unique style is really showcased in Cat's Eye. It explores the relationship between Elaine and her sometimes friend/ sometimes bully Cordelia. Atwood is brilliant in writing about the awful complexities of the relationship between the bully and the bullied. She seems to express the things that we know go on between young girls but are afraid to admit.
This really is a great read, one that will get you thinking and stay with you long after you've finished the final pages.
And if you are interested in Atwood, i would also recommend 'The Robber Bride' and 'The Blind Assassin'.
What a horrible and wonderful book. January 21, 2007
Hollie Fisher (London, UK)
4 out of 5 found this review helpful
I loved this book. I read it in two days, unable to put it down, and brought to tears repeatedly. This book says everything about little girls that no one says. We are all Elaine, and Cordelia at different times. The relationships between Elaine and the other female characters in the book were too realistic - the made me think of things I'd rather not think about, friends I have now who were bullies when we were children, things that happened that we all chose not to notice, times when I chould have stood up to someone and didn't. Even Elaine's judgement of Susie had me cringing - I'm sure that we all make such unfair judgements every day. I didn't feel like the men in the book were portrayed as well - the men I know who have read this book were unimpressed by the main characters assessment of men, who she supposedly had a great insight into - but the book really wasn't about men. Its not a feminist story though, its just a story about women. Thats a bit of a muddled review, I know, but I think everyone should read this. There isn't much of a plot - its an exploration, more than a story. I had nightmares about Elaine peeling her feet in the dark after this, I cried on a bus when I read about the last time she saw Cordelia. I hated and loved Elaine. I'll have to read this again soon, but just now I'm still cringing at the thought of it, and obsessing over little details, like Elaines shredded fingernails, her teenage pretentiousness, the dark undercurrents, and worrying implications about Cordelia's father.... Lol, I'll write a more coherent review in a few weeks...
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