Book Review: The Mars Room
Rachel Kushner’s The Mars Room tells the story of one woman’s life inside the prison system – Contributed by Jenny Zoe Casey In her novel The Mars Room, Rachel Kushner (http://rachelkushner.com) considers our criminal justice system from a rare vantage point – that of a vulnerable young woman who is both subject to it and victimized by it. Kushner’s protagonist, Romy, is just a few years shy of a youth spent in the crevices of working class San Francisco, amongst a cohort trapped in cycles of petty crime, drug use, dysfunction, and poverty. The mother of a young boy whose father is absent, she makes her living as a lap dancer. For reasons that seem rational and easy to understand, Romy finds herself the recipient of two consecutive life sentences, plus a ludicrous additional six years. Thus we are introduced to her experience of life in a women’s prison. According… Continue reading