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We all have what if's: What if I had majored in this instead of that. What if I had taken that job offer. What if? Rodham is built on what if's - the biggest being: what if Hillary Rodham Clinton had stayed Hillary Rodham? The answer is a weird, fever dream of a novel which speculates about one of the infinite ways in which history could have turned out differently. What makes this book so unsettling is that this isn't an alternate reality where things are shiny and happy and better - things are mostly the same, except where they're not. I don't know that I would have been satisfied with the former, but I do know I wasn't entirely satisfied with the latter. Spoilers ahead! Ye be warned. There was so much ground to cover that a lot got lost in the shuffle. I wish that the racial dynamics between Hillary, Gwen, and Carol Moseley Braun had been further explored. It was an opportunity to talk about the failures of mainstream feminism but we never really got there. Ditto for the sexual assault, Donald Trump, and the American political climate. This book is like the literary equivalent of a diss track. Sittenfeld isn't putting the words "You never would have been president if not for me," in Hillary's mouth, but she's also not not doing that. It's hard not to feel like this book is a big middle finger to Bill Clinton, but not in a way that is satisfying - the whole point is Hillary without Bill, but the book still seems to orbit him. I have feelings about Sittenfeld's use of female presidential candidates' memoirs in the writing of this book. It makes it seem like her work is less Hillary than an amalgamation of female politicians which feels...icky. There's a LOT to unpack in this novel, and what I've mentioned here is only a small part. Things get real weird, real quick when your sandbox is the lives of living people, and that's ultimately why I struggle to wrap my brain around this book. I love historical fiction, but there's not enough emotional distance from this history - it's hard to suspend belief and buy in. I'm not saying not to read it - I think it would make an excellent book club pick! There's SO much to discuss! via Instagram https://instagr.am/p/CCGbh0gggfp/