VOX

By: Christina Dalcher

Narrated by: Laurence Bouvard

‘Intelligent, suspenseful, provocative, and intensely disturbing – everything a great novel should be’ LEE CHILD

‘Extraordinary’ LOUISE O’NEILL
‘A truly compulsive novel.’ STYLIST

‘The book of the moment!’ MARIE CLAIRE

‘This book will blow your mind’ PRIMA

‘A petrifying reimagining of The Handmaid’s Tale’ ELLE

‘A fast-paced, twisting thriller that left me speechless.’ DAILY MAIL

‘Terrifying’ RED

‘A novel ripe for the #MeToo era’ VANITY FAIR

‘A dazzling debut.’ GOOD HOUSEKEEPING

‘Thought-provoking and thrilling. I was left speechless!’ WOMAN & HOME

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…

©2018 Christina Dalcher (P)2018 HarperCollins Publishers

Critic reviews

"A petrifying re-imagining of The Handmaid's Tale in the present, and a timely reminder of the power and importance of language." (Marta Bausells, Elle)

"This book will blow your mind." (Nina Pottell, Prima)

"Intelligent, suspenseful, provocative, and intensely disturbing - everything a great novel should be." (Lee Child)

Not for me

I loved the premise of this story but that's about it. Really I am here to review the narrator. The narrator made an average piece of writing bad. It was a cringey performance that was at best, annoying, and at worst, offensive! I didn't appreciate the different stereotyped ethnicities in the vocal performance.

Could have done without the Asian accent

I'd initially rated the book 5 stars because despite that it has some on-the-nose metaphors, it is an interesting premise with good commentary and I can look past some corny similes in a debut novel.

Unfortunately I've just come to chapter 25, where an Asian character is introduced and described in extremely stereotypical terms and with an offensive impression of an accent. How did that get past an editor? Seeing as this was published in 2018, it is inexcusable, distracting, and subtracts from the ability to take its societal critiques seriously.