Eleven Percent is a weird little dystopian novel that felt like nothing else I’ve ever read. Women rule the world and men are kept in captivity until… needed. Nature is reclaiming patriarchal structures, as women are creating new buildings/cities with curves. We learn about four distinct women whose lives intertwine and who share their secrets with us. Thought-provoking, eerie, bizarre – I couldn’t put it down.

Wow this book was a wild ride. A world where only 11% of biological men are left (to avoid inbreeding), a religion where they encourage self pleasure, super feminist, love and lost. Pick this one up with an open mind and enjoy because I certainly did.

Wow this was really good and had me thinking all sorts of things when k finished! It really stays with you. It’s similar to The Handmaids Tale but also totally different and felt fresh. It deals in a lot of important topics but never felt like bogged down by those topics. It was just a really engaging read. Will be adding to our library 100%!

Overall an interesting thought experiment on one possible answer to the question, "What would happen if TERFs took over?" The dystopian society that exists in this book was equal parts horrifying and morbidly fascinating. It took me until just over halfway through the book to decide if I liked it, and I think I did, but mostly it was just so disgusting, horrific, and shocking (while also being excellently written) that I couldn't put it down. Some parts were completely devastating, and while there was a little bit of joy at the end for two of the characters, I don't feel like the ending was necessarily happy. It certainly wasn't hopeful, but it was thought-provoking. I think I'll probably reread this one once the final version is released because I'm sure there were some things I missed the first time through.

"Welcome! You have entered a horny dystopian world where your skin crawls from culture shock" would be the city sign for Eleven Percent. This might sound negative, but honestly I found it fascinating. Put on your seatbelt for the giant snake (euphemism intended), menstrual blood, and unhinged witchcraft.

From an anthropological lens it is fascinating to imagine a society in which society is only made up of a single sex where the opposite sex (denote the imperative biological implications of sex vs. gender) is locked up for reproductive use and treated as breeding stock. However, this novel is a far cry from the Handmaids Tale, it is not a story of rebellion, overcoming an unfair system, or a political warning. The story is really about human nature and the impact of society, regardless of what the governing political body may be.

None of these characters are people you would want to be. Each of them is uniquely deeply scarred by the rigidity of the social structure and simply trying to live the best life they can scrape together. Maren gives us uniquely human moments in the story that incite our empathy despite the foreign, almost wrong, world. She makes a commentary that regardless of "progress" there are people that chafe against society and that doesn't mean they are BAD.

*SLIGHT SPOILER* By the end you don't see any major dissent against the system or strong statement against the social structure. If that's what you're looking for, you'll be frustrated and disappointed.

I saw many DNFs for the english version of this book in the reviews, I personally didn't have any issues with the writing style, but I read transliterated texts with ease. I didn't experience any disruptive sentence structure or major issues with pace. The only spot I felt the novel dragged a bit was in Eva's perspective. You've already put the pieces of her story together, had the whole creepy theology experience, and seen living in the slums away from society. Felt redundant. Overall rating 3.5/5 - rounded up for star purposes.

Appreciation to NetGalley, the author, and publisher for access to this digital ARC in return for an honest review.

I received an ARC from the publisher in exchange for an honest review

Eleven Percent by Maren Uthaug is a third person multi-POV Danish speculative novel in the vein of The Handmaid's Tale. For the most part, men have been removed from society and many are kept in a Center for the purposes of procreation. Medea is a pagan witch who protests the Centers but there has been little in the way of change. When the boy who lives with Medea's found family goes missing, a lot more comes to light than just who his unnamed mother was.

My review style for this book is far more of an analysis than how I usually do reviews, which is more based on what I liked and what different aspects of the text made me think. I struggle to say whether or not I like Eleven Percent but it's in the same way I wonder if I like Handmaid's Tale or 1984; these books make me think deeper about the themes and whether or not I enjoy them is way down the ladder in what's going through my head.

The number one thing that had me thinking was how there is such emphasis on gender essentialism and how removing men has improved the world and yet there's still problems. When it is brought up that violent crimes, including SA, have gone down, there's always this caveat of ‘by men’ which indicates to me that violent crimes is very much still happening but it's either rare or it's swept under the rug. I'm genuinely inclined to believe that it could be the latter because there's some evidence that certain aspects of toxic femininity have remained in this society. Men are kept pliant for the pleasure of women and the way men are talked about calls right back to the way I remember hearing men talk about women on TV as a kid. The reader is supposed to empathize with the men and pay attention to how the POV characters express disgust toward male bodies.

The other thing that got me thinking was gender in relation to trans identities. I'm Nonbinary and, for me, gender is a performance and a social construct I'm asked to play a part in, but I have trans friends who I know that isn't the case at all. Gender is something very different for them. I bring this up because we have two characters, Lars and Eva, who for all intents and purposes are transgender but might not present how the reader is familiar with trans characters. There's ideas presented that I'm familiar with but are done in new ways, especially in relation to Lars, who is referred to as a ‘manlady’ (a term that feels like it's meant to be derogatory). Lars has silicone genitalia and uses ‘he/him’ pronouns but also breastfeeds as a business. And then there's Eva who had to hide that she is AMAB in this world that is very hostile to men. Lars is presented as more socially acceptable than Eva in the book even though Eva is a child.

There's just so much to unpack here in regards to gender essentialism and feminism and the major theme is that gender essentialism doesn't help anyone. It harms children, it harms the genders in the traditional binary, it creates little room for those outside the binary like Enbies, and it doesn't create a utopia no matter which way you slice it. The men are treated like animals in a zoo so the glimpses that we get show them acting docile, almost like dolls, and their role in society is essentially to help keep humanity going and not much else. I'm gonna have to wait for the book to be officially released to start talking about it and it's gonna be really hard because I do want to talk to people about all the thoughts swirling in my head right now as an AFAB Enby

Content warning for mentions of SA and anti-trans attitudes

I would recommend this to readers who got a lot out of discussing The Handmaid's Tale and 1984 and those looking for their next book club read that discusses gender essentialism

Eleven Percent takes place in a world where only women are allowed to live freely. Men are locked up in “spas” where the women can go to either make a baby or get pleasure from a man. Eleven Percent shares the point of views of 4 women, Medea (a witch and snake whisperer who thinks the spas are awful), Wicca (a Christian priest who has lost her lover), Silence (a woman who doesn’t talk after an incident with telling a friend’s secret) and Eva (a woman who is a doctor at one of the spas.) Their lives intertwine in ways you could never imagine.

I found Eleven Percent to be super interesting and really messed up. Some parts were super good and kept me on my toes, while other parts felt irrelevant to the story. Each character was unique. I love how they were all connected in some way or another.

Thank you NetGalley and Maren Uthaug for the opportunity to read this ARC. All opinions are my own

Unfortunately, I DNF'd this book by around 15%. I find the premise super interesting, but I kept rereading the setup and just couldn't keep track of the plot and couldn't really get into the worldbuilding. I really wanted to like this book, but I just couldn't get into it. The writing is interesting, but I just couldn't keep getting through the book.

This was a little out of my comfort zone, specifically all the talk about pregnancy and babies and stuff. I didn't finish but the writing was great. The content just wasn't for me.

Thank you NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for the advanced copy of this book in exchange for am honest review. Although the blurb and cover attracted me to this book, I found it really difficult to get into and decided to DNF it around the 20% mark. The writing style was good but I found the structure difficult to follow and felt confused about what was going on. I might try to pick this up again sometime. Give it another go.

absolutely chaotic. in the best way possible. it freaked me out in a way that i liked. this story really made me sit and think for a little bit after i finished reading. all i can say is : men

review on goodreads: If you like weird you’ll like this dystopian land where only 11 percent of the population are men. It’s definitely an interesting take on a world ran entirely by woman and it’s as weird as they come with blood and snake worshipping and man ladies. It’s also definitely what I’d expect to be the outcome of extremely religious fanatic woman if they were to take over the world.

DNF

I started off with no clue what was happening, no clue of its relevance to the plotline. It was the initial description that intrigued me however, I'm about 10% of the way through and have completely lost interest.
How does caring for snakes and lack of money contribute to the world? I have no interest in chores, I want the story.
I'm not sure if it's just not my cup of tea, the blurb grabbed me but there was nothing to make me want to keep going.
Ages 16+ due to mature themes.

I DNF this book. After about a week of trying to force myself to read it, I couldn’t do it. I really wanted to like the storyline but the way it was written was hard to read, I don’t know if it was translation or what, but nothing about the writing flowed. Also the transphobia was hard to get over to enjoy the book as a whole. Then they started mentioning getting sperm from a minor child to mix with menstrual blood and I was out. Great concept.

Unfortunately, I just really could not get into this book. The premise sounded really cool but if a book does not hook me from the beginning I have a hard time enjoying it.

I . . . very much wanted to enjoy this. Unfortunately, it just wasn’t for me. From page one, I wasn’t entirely sure what was going on, but I immediately felt unsettled. While I recognize that this is the intention behind the thematics of the novel itself, an unsettling vibe does little when a reader can’t completely comprehend what’s occurring on the page to make them unsettled. Even after reading several pages multiple times over, I found myself garnering bits and pieces of what was happening, but not enough to fully grasp the allure that Eleven Percent claims to have.

In further research of the book proper, I can see that its original version was in Danish, and I wonder if some things were lost in translation when converting the book to the English language. This is further exemplified by particular word choices that seemed out of place and sentence structures that didn’t quite make sense, no matter how many times you read them. More often than not, these issues arise when things are translated literally, rather than restructured to accommodate its destination language.

Another grievance experienced is that the books overall synopsis does little to convey the truly unsettling horrors that will occur within the book. Despite it’s tagline relating it to something akin to a reverse Handmaid’s Tale, the lack of trigger warnings and the overall blasé way in which concepts and themes are dropped into the synopsis do a disservice to readers who may need to tread carefully when delving into some heavier topic’d books. Particularly so when the subject matter is thought-provoking and enticing enough to attract readers of all kinds. These ideologies of the dangers of testosterone (specifically from male-identifying individuals), the separation between the heretical pagan magics and the witchcraft practiced by Christian Priestesses (another aspect of the story that feels lost in translation, as the dichotomy between the two magic systems doesn’t quite exist in its English form)

There was further an undeniable notion that there were far more words and sentences used then necessary. For instance, within the first few pages alone, things were conveyed with five or six additional sentences, despite the point being made (semi) clear with the first one. This repetitive nature further made the trudge through the book a slog that further contributed to an unenjoyable reading experience.

The novel separated the narrative between four points of view, which sought to break up the repetitive monotony, but the overall experience was very much something akin to asking oneself “What did I just read?” or “What just happened?”.

The overall novel felt unfleshed out, disjointed and cobbled together, to the point where I found myself going back and rereading chapters and pages, as I felt like I had missed something only to discover that it wasn’t me, but the book.

I’m rating this a 2.5, rounded down to 2, purely for its potential, as the thought behind the book is clearly someone impassioned about the speculative fiction of a women-ran world, but it fails to deliver anything other than a confusing and unsettling reading experience.

I don’t feel it’s fair to rate this book 1-star, as there is a greater part of me that does truly feel like it makes far more sense in its source language.

Thank you to Netgalley for the ARC!

This was strange! The writing had a really unique style to it, but I couldn't quite commit to the tone or premise. Some of the wording was a little awkward too. All in all an interesting story

While I was hesitant to share a review, the initial “WTH did I just read” has worn off. The misleading synopsis and lack of trigger warnings didn’t properly prepare me for some of the very disturbing aspects that lie within.

Describing this book as “an inverse to The Handmaid’s Tale” is a stretch as it isn’t even a minor subplot. This book contains many LGBTQ+ themes that parallel what this community continues to experience today along with inverse bigotry and misogyny throughout.

I’m not sure if it’s the writing style, or error in translation, but there are portions of the book that don’t make sense. For example, Christian “priestesses” practice witchcraft but look down on pagans whom practice similar “magic” and are referred to as witches. There were also points in the story where things didn’t progress naturally and I had to go back to see if I missed something. (I didn’t.)

Trigger warnings: Blood, Classism, Forced institutionalization/Slavery, Sexism, Dysphoria, Pregnancy, Transphobia, Animal death, Death during childbirth, Murder, Misogyny, Religious bigotry, Hate crime and Outing

This book is for someone who wants a very literary and almost fantasy dystopian novel about what would happen if women were in charge. I was not able to finish this book because I realized after about 10% that it just was not for me. I thought it was a little bit gross with all of the animal death and cooking with menstrual blood. I am not the person for this book!

When I read something that is going to be taking on very complex ideas, I want to feel like the author is in control of what they're saying. There were elements here that made me deeply uncomfortable because they felt like genuine bad trans rep as opposed to a troubling of the gender binary that I would expect from a book with a dystopian matriarchy. I don't know if it was a translation issue, but I found myself doubting where the author was leading me and, in the end, didn't feel like I came away with anything I had not already considered. I think there's a real place for this type of book, but this one absolutely missed for me.