Tags: Poverty, Futures, Mental instability, Victimization, Females, Dysfunctional society, Outcomes

Notes that this book gives us vivid multiple pictures of lives lived in that present time and of possible futures, 150 years hence. It is a rich book that can be interpreted on many different levels. Throughout her narrative, Ms. Piercy shows us: the life of a poor Chicano single parent, struggling to provide some sort of a life for herself and her child; the plight of poor women in a society that doesn't really care, and the plight of economically disadvantaged women and men captured in the cruel web of the mental health [sic] system. We experience the struggle of a person helpless to extricate herself from the consequences of a diagnosis routinely applied to patients on admission to psychiatric institutions. As a contrast to those dour pictures, we are also given a vivid picture of a future society that provides hope for humanity and serves as the only positive refuge for our protagonist.

Woman on the edge of time.pdf