History Literature / ThePower

* ApocalypseHow: The main focus of the story is the how women becoming the more physically intimidating sex upends the world's social order. The framing device makes it clear that a Class 2 is on the way, eventually revealed to have caused humanity to regress to [[spoiler: the Stone Age]]. The actual mechanics of said apocalypse is hinted at early, then described explicitly at the conclusion.

** [[spoiler: Darrell Monke]] has a very ugly death that he very much deserved.

* AuthorAvatar: Neil, the book’s InUniverse author from the FramingDevice, lays out Alderman’s message in his discourse with his editor, a woman who engages in “playful” sexual chatter with him and dismisses his arguments with fairly sexist logic dressed up in the language of science. (Incidentally, this chauvinistic woman is [[SelfDeprecation herself named Naomi]].)

** Likewise, [[spoiler: Darrell Monke]] has a very ugly death that he very much deserved.

* AsskickingEqualsAuthority: Portrayed as the root of misogyny and human gender roles. For most of human history, this trope combined with men being physically larger than women meant that most societies defaulted to patriarchy. The emergence of the power means that, in places where violence was still a daily fact of life, the tables rapidly turn. [[spoiler:It's why the destruction of civilization at the end of the book causes most of the world to become a {{matriarchy}}.]]

* AndItWorked: The framing device shows that, at the cost of [[spoiler: a five-thousand-year Dark Age]], Mother Eve's plan to remake society succeeded, despite Roxy insisting the cost was too high. [[spoiler:However, it just created the same society in the end, with all of the violence and violation and discrimination throughout the ages, but with men as the victims this time around.]]

* TheCaligula: What Tatiana Moskalev becomes as her reign over Bessapara grows ever more extreme. Her mental stability disentegrates as she starts loses.

''The Power'' is a speculative sci-fi novel by Naomi Alderman, based around the premise of women having the ability to use [[ShockAndAwe electricity]] from their hands. As a result, the world is quickly upended as our four protagonists watch society change.

The book has been adapted into an Amazon Prime TV series still in production.

* MafiaPrincess: Roxy, a gangster's daughter from a [[KosherNostra Jewish crime family]] in the UK. She lives a comfortable life due to her dad's business and is fully aware of it, seizing control from him later.

* FemaleGaze: Deliberately compared and contrasted with the MaleGaze. Many of Tunde's scenes involve a woman looking at him in a way that uses an implicit balance of power that would usually signify the MaleGaze. All of this comes around the to book's overall theme of gender stereotypes having a lot more to do with power imbalance than biology or social roles.

* TheCaligula: What Tatiana Moskalev becomes as her reign over Bessapara grows ever more extreme.

* {{Gendercide}}: Men's Rights Activists start predicting this almost immediately after the Power emerges. [[spoiler: About a decade later, Bessapara puts it into practice, killing 90% of their male population and only keeping the remaining 10% to [[SexSlave stud]].]]

* LadyLand: Tatiana intends to turn Bessapara into one.
%%* MafiaPrincess: Roxy.

* MyEyesAreUpHere / MrFanservice: Tunde. To the point that his [[spoiler: obituary]] mentions it.

* SpiritualSuccessor: Both this and a SpiritualAntithesis to ''Literature/TheHandmaidsTale'', with Creator/MargaretAtwood's full blessing. Both deal with the subjugation of a gender and with power imbalance. But while ''The Handmaid's Tale'' subjugated women, didn't last long, and needed a full dystopia to work, ''The Power'' subjugated men, [[spoiler:lasted for thousands of years, and in the end was no more dystopian than our current state of affairs with the genders switched... but which still comes off as pretty dystopian, hammering in the point even further about the nature of power and of our current society.]]

** The last we see of Tunde is him being stuffed into the trunk of a car, hoping that the driver is who she says she is. Roxy later mentions she sent someone to smuggle him out of a Besapara, but his actual fate is never confirmed. This is most likely an allusion to ''Literature/TheHandmaidsTale'', which ends in much the same way.

* FromNobodyToNightmare: All three female protagonists, plus Tatiana Moskolev. Roxy goes from a gangster's bastard daughter to one of the most powerful people in Europe. Margot goes from a big city mayor to one of the most influential members of Congress. Mother Eve goes from an unwanted runaway to the world's most prominent religious figure. Tatiana goes from being a trophy wife to the supreme leader of a nation with a cache of [=WMDs=]. [[spoiler: And each of them has a role to play in ending the world.]]
* FutureImperfect: Five thousand years after the Cataclysm which ended civilization (one just like ours, aside from the Power existing) the majority are skeptical that patriarchies ever existed, ignoring and reinterpreting archeological or other evidence which shows it did. They also don't know what the "bitten fruit" symbol means (Apple's logo) that is found on some ancient artifacts, used as a base (old iPods repurposed).
* {{Gendercide}}: Mens' Rights Activists start predicting this almost immediately after the Power emerges. [[spoiler: About a decade later, Bessapara puts it into practice, killing 90% of their male population and only keeping the remaining 10% to [[SexSlave stud]].]]

* HandWave: The UsefulNotes/WorldWarII-era anti-chemical-weapon agent Guardian Angel is blamed for the development of the Power. Exactly ''how'' the chemical could so drastically alter the biology of cisgender female humans--and some intersex males--is neither explained nor particularly relevant to the plot. However, it is theorized this might have just activated dormant genes too.

* JustBeforeTheEnd: The framing device and chapter openers make it clear the modern world and the Power are not destined to coexist.

* {{Matriarchy}}: The inevitable result of the power balance shifting. Bessapara is a straight up [[NoWomansLand No Man's Land]], and other governments are starting to shift towards women in military and power positions. [[spoiler:Five thousand years in the future, it seems to be close to modern-day patriarchy with a few exceptions, like the fact that male soldiers are almost unheard of.]]

* PowerLossDepression: After her father and half-brother steal her skein, Roxy falls into quite the funk over the perceived loss of her ultimate Action Girl persona.

%%* AllOfTheOtherReindeer: Jos. Her short-lived boyfriend counts as well.

%%* DirtyOldWoman: Margot.

%%* KarmaHoudini: Bernie fucking Monke.

* MotherGoddess: Allie reinterprets Christian beliefs with Mary being {{God in human form}} (technically she says the divine is neither female nor male, but appearing as the former now to balance things out, but it works out this way).

The book has been adapted into an Amazon Prime TV series.

Spoilers abound.

* SocietyMarchesOn: The segment of the story set in Saudi Arabia mentions that women there aren't even allowed to drive. This law was repealed in 2017, a year after the book came out.

* MixedAncestry: Allie is mixed race, but it's only mentioned a couple times. We never learn what her exact background is, although she's described as having dark skin.

* AbusiveParents: Allie's foster parents are both abusive. Her foster father beats and rapes her as "punishment", while his wife knows of this but does nothing, as she approves (she'd also psychologically abused Allie by threatening her with Hell for supposed misdeeds). [[spoiler:Later it turns out that her foster mother was the ''instigator'' of him raping Allie as "punishment for her sins", making it even worse.]]

* AbusiveParents: Allie's foster parents are both abusive. Her foster father beats and rapes her as "punishment", while his wife knows of this but does nothing, as she approves (she'd also psychologically abused Allie by threatening her with Hell for supposed misdeeds).

* HeManWomanHater: Desconstructed rather aggressively. The book portrays ideas about male and female strength, fragility, and suitability flip-flopping within just a few years. The DistantFinale shows that many of this trope's trappings have become flipped entirely in the intervening Dark Age.

* MixedAncestry: Allie is mixed race, but it's only mentioned a couple times.

* SocietyMarchesOn: The segment of the story set in Saudi Arabia mentions that women there aren't even allowed to drive. This law was repealed in 2017.

* HandWave: The UsefulNotes/WorldWarII-era anti-chemical-weapon agent Guardian Angel is blamed for the development of the Power. Exactly ''how'' the chemical could so drastically alter the biology of human females--and ''only'' human females--is neither explained nor particularly relevant to the plot.

* MakeItLookLikeAnAccident: Roxy and Darrell lampshade this before they kill Newland. They make it look accidental as a "favor" so his family could get life insurance.

* FantasticDrug: Roxy makes her fortune on "Glitter," a drug that boosts Power reserves of the women who take it.

* BewareTheSuperman: Played with. A theme of the novel is that abuses of power are not constrained to any single gender.

* HidingBehindReligion: Allie's foster parents make a big deal about good, upstanding Christians, her mother even congratulating herself over their charitable act of taking her in. Yet they are both horribly abusive to Allie, and don't let this go beyond lip service.

* HearingVoices: Allie hears a voice that counsels and guides her, which calls her "daughter".

* KarmaHoudini: Bernie fucking Monke.

* MixedAncestry: Allie is mixed race

* AmbiguousGenderIdentity: The Power draws a rather stark line between male and female. Jos's boyfriend Ryan is an example of how biology isn't quite so clear. Despite being biologically male, he has a chromosomal abnormality that means he ''also'' has a skein. In-universe, this is seen as an abnormality that is also grounds for a particular fetish.

* RapeAsDrama: Allie is raped by her foster father the chapter she's introduced in.

* ShockAndAwe: What women can do.

* AllOfTheOtherReindeer: Jos. Her short-lived boyfriend counts as well.

* BreakTheHaughty: What happens to [[spoiler:Roxy]].

* DirtyOldWoman: Margot.

* HearingVoices: Allie.

* MafiaPrincess: Roxy.

* NearRapeExperience: Tunde is nearly raped by a woman in Delhi, but luckily three other women arrive and stop her.

* AndItWorked: The framing device shows that, at the cost of [[spoiler: a five-thousand year Dark Age]] Mother Eve's plan to remake society succeeded, despite Roxy insisting the cost was too high. [[spoiler:However, it just created the same society in the end, with all of the violence and violation and discrimination throughout the ages, but with men as the victims this time around.]]

** Saudi Arabia and Moldova are the first countries to fall after the Power is awakened. Saudi Arabia being the world's most repressive regime toward women, and Moldova being the world capital of sex trafficking.

* AsskickingEqualsAuthority: Portrayed as the root of misogyny and human gender roles. For most of human history, this trope combined with men being physically larger than women meant that most societies defaulted to patriarchy. The emergence of the power means that, in places where violence was still a daily fact of life, the tables rapidly turn. [[spoiler:The destruction of civilization at the end of the book causes most of the world to become a {{matriarchy}}.]]

* BreakTheHaughty. what happens to [[spoiler:Roxy]].

* GroinAttack: [[spoiler: After humanity was bombed back to the Stone Age, a form of genital mutilation was invented that made it impossible for a man to get an erection without skein stimulation, and make ejaculation painful, with [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything clear allusions]] to real-life female genital mutilation. There are cave paintings of this practice, and it's still practiced in several European countries in the modern day of the novel.]]
* HandWave: The World War II era anti-chemical-weapon agent Guardian Angel is blamed for the development of the Power. Exactly ''how'' the chemical could so drastically alter the biology of human females--and ''only'' human females--is neither explained nor particularly relevant to the plot.

* HeelFaceDoorSlam: [[spoiler:At the last minute when she realizes that her foster mother was just as responsible for her abuse as her foster father, Allie considers not listening to the voice and not upending civilization. Ultimately, though, she goes through with it.]]

* WomenAreWiser: [[SubvertedTrope No, they aren't]], no matter how much some of them try to claim otherwise. In fact, the entirety of the trope is deconstructed by the author and editor in the closing comments (albeit with a gender flip). [[spoiler: The editor argues that the partial patriarchies of the past (obviously a stand in for historical matriarchies) were more peaceful and kinder regimes as proof that men are the more moral, kinder gender. The author fires back that this was only because, as the weaker sex, any system that favored men had to be a system not built on violence. Therefore, women are wiser because they lack the ability to seize power through violence and must find it through other means. And as the book demonstrates, once that caveat is gone, they're just as evil as men were.]]