Book 9 - 2020
Book 9: Vox by Christina Dalcher - 326 pages
Description from bookdepository.co.uk:
Silence can be deafening.
Jean McClellan spends her time in almost complete silence, limited to just one hundred words a day. Any more, and a thousand volts of electricity will course through her veins.
Now the new government is in power, everything has changed. But only if you're a woman.
Almost overnight, bank accounts are frozen, passports are taken away and seventy million women lose their jobs. Even more terrifyingly, young girls are no longer taught to read or write.
For herself, her daughter, and for every woman silenced, Jean will reclaim her voice. This is only the beginning…
Thoughts:
I’ve seen this book described as a modern day Handmaid’s Tale and it’s an apt description. Jean is a neurolinguist living in a dystopian U.S.A where women are restricted to speaking only 100 words a day. It’s a form of oppression aimed at making women both literally and metaphorically silent. Eventually the aim seems to be that women will say nothing at all. This is all the idea of the extreme religious right who have taken a new president (there are certainly illusions to Trump here) as their puppet and want to return to the old ways when women did nothing but her husband’s (or closest male relative) will. Like Handmaid’s Tale, the ultimate flaw in this plan, particularly the fact that a lot of men don’t actually want to live in a world of this making, never seems to strike the orchestrators of this insanity. Unlike the Handmaid’s Tale, the orchestrators here plan to take this nonsense global, which lends itself to Jean’s involvement throughout the story. Like Handmaid’s Tale, there is a lot of unsettling things in this book. As a single woman, who plans to have children on her own, I found this idea of being under the thumb of my father or younger brother horrifying. The notion that we can convert gay people so long as we lock them together in a cage long enough is disgusting. The idea that we can bespell our boys into believing this nonsense is frighteningly real; on numerous occasions Jean’s teenage son tells her why the world is ‘supposed’ to be this way, bewitched by his teachers. I could hear my brother’s voice in my head, talking to my mother the same way. The content might differ, but the air of superiority is the same. The inadequate response of Jean’s husband Patrick reminds me of my father, though he is eventually redeemed in an ending that might be the one flaw in the book. It’s over too soon, not explained very well, and well, results in a mighty convenient outcome for Jean. But I guess that particular story was not the driving force of the narrative. Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this book, even with its flaws. I read most of it on a flight, and then felt compelled to finish the rest in my spare time on my first night on holidays in Cuba. It is an easy read, a compelling idea, and a scary reminder of why we need to fight every time someone threatens our liberties.
9 / 50 books. 18% done!
2646 / 15000 pages. 18% done!
Currently reading:
Journey to the West by Cheng-En Wu - 673 pages
Wolfe Island by Lucy Treloar - 386 pages
Boy Swallows Universe by Trent Dalton - 496 pages
And coming up:
The Second Chronicles of Thomas Covenant: Volume 3: White Gold Wielder by Stephen Donaldson - 500 pages
The Odyssey by Homer - 324 pages
Defying Limits: Lessons from the Edge of the Universe by Dr. Dave Williams - 215 pages
Description from bookdepository.co.uk:
Silence can be deafening.
Jean McClellan spends her time in almost complete silence, limited to just one hundred words a day. Any more, and a thousand volts of electricity will course through her veins.
Now the new government is in power, everything has changed. But only if you're a woman.
Almost overnight, bank accounts are frozen, passports are taken away and seventy million women lose their jobs. Even more terrifyingly, young girls are no longer taught to read or write.
For herself, her daughter, and for every woman silenced, Jean will reclaim her voice. This is only the beginning…
Thoughts:
I’ve seen this book described as a modern day Handmaid’s Tale and it’s an apt description. Jean is a neurolinguist living in a dystopian U.S.A where women are restricted to speaking only 100 words a day. It’s a form of oppression aimed at making women both literally and metaphorically silent. Eventually the aim seems to be that women will say nothing at all. This is all the idea of the extreme religious right who have taken a new president (there are certainly illusions to Trump here) as their puppet and want to return to the old ways when women did nothing but her husband’s (or closest male relative) will. Like Handmaid’s Tale, the ultimate flaw in this plan, particularly the fact that a lot of men don’t actually want to live in a world of this making, never seems to strike the orchestrators of this insanity. Unlike the Handmaid’s Tale, the orchestrators here plan to take this nonsense global, which lends itself to Jean’s involvement throughout the story. Like Handmaid’s Tale, there is a lot of unsettling things in this book. As a single woman, who plans to have children on her own, I found this idea of being under the thumb of my father or younger brother horrifying. The notion that we can convert gay people so long as we lock them together in a cage long enough is disgusting. The idea that we can bespell our boys into believing this nonsense is frighteningly real; on numerous occasions Jean’s teenage son tells her why the world is ‘supposed’ to be this way, bewitched by his teachers. I could hear my brother’s voice in my head, talking to my mother the same way. The content might differ, but the air of superiority is the same. The inadequate response of Jean’s husband Patrick reminds me of my father, though he is eventually redeemed in an ending that might be the one flaw in the book. It’s over too soon, not explained very well, and well, results in a mighty convenient outcome for Jean. But I guess that particular story was not the driving force of the narrative. Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this book, even with its flaws. I read most of it on a flight, and then felt compelled to finish the rest in my spare time on my first night on holidays in Cuba. It is an easy read, a compelling idea, and a scary reminder of why we need to fight every time someone threatens our liberties.
9 / 50 books. 18% done!
2646 / 15000 pages. 18% done!
Currently reading:
Journey to the West by Cheng-En Wu - 673 pages
Wolfe Island by Lucy Treloar - 386 pages
Boy Swallows Universe by Trent Dalton - 496 pages
And coming up:
The Second Chronicles of Thomas Covenant: Volume 3: White Gold Wielder by Stephen Donaldson - 500 pages
The Odyssey by Homer - 324 pages
Defying Limits: Lessons from the Edge of the Universe by Dr. Dave Williams - 215 pages