REVIEW: VOX by Christina Dalcher

VOX by Christina Dalcher

RATING: ★★★★★

SIMILAR READS: THE HANDMAID’S TALE by Margaret Atwood.

GENRE: Dystopian fiction.

“Evil triumphs when good men do nothing. That’s what they say, right?”

I have given few books this year a full five-star rating. VOX is, unquestionably, deserving of it. When the Trump era began, I read HANDMAID’S TALE, thinking that it would be all too real, too scary, to get through with the realities of this administration on the horizon. I think that’s what makes a good dystopian novel: the ability for the horrors of the new society to seem achievable. Maybe not perfectly realistic at the moment, but looming in the future, dark, waiting.

I’m going to be honest, while HANDMAID’S was certainly a chilling dystopia with a lot of cultural connections and fears realized within its narrative, I didn’t think it was as realistic (or, I guess, “achievable”) as a lot of readers made it out to be. VOX, while not entirely, seamlessly plausible, certainly lays out a possible, future America in which women’s voices are silenced. Quick warning here for HANDMAID’S spoilers!

After taking a lot of time to mull over the differences and figure out what it really was about this book that struck me more than Atwood’s seminal, misogynistic, dystopian novel, I figured a few things out.

First, where HANDMAID’S TALE’s fundamentalist Christian dictatorship is thrust upon the government by a terrorist attack, VOX’s is the result of the same process and ideologies responsible for the Trump administration–racist, sexist, conservative, white America felt empowered by a candidate who embodied their ideals. At the same time, voter turnout among the people who could help change the tide–white, liberal women and men–was minimal. Protagonist Jeanie isn’t very concerned at the onslaught of the Pure administration, and her college roommate, Jackie, a gay woman and basically the picture of today’s pussyhat-wearing, Women’s March-ing feminist, tries, to no avail, to convince her to march, protest, and vote. One cyclical message throughout the text is multiple interpretations of an Edmund Burke quote: “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” Jeanie says it, Jackie says it, and Jeanie’s children say it, and it serves as a reminder of the fact that ignorance, privilege, and the ideas that influence so many people today–that their votes won’t matter anyway, that whatever changes could happen won’t be “that bad,” that they can skate by without consequence–can have incredible consequences for everyone.

Where HANDMAID’S touches upon issues that undoubtedly plagued the 80s, like women’s reproductive rights, VOX chillingly touches upon issues that plague women and LGBTQIA+ people today. In a world where Dr. Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony is seen as a lie, where women and LGBTQIA+ people’s stories aren’t being listened to, VOX rings incredibly true. I actually found a lot of solace in this book; I was able to identify with Jeanie’s palpable rage at the world because in this administration, I feel that, too.

And maybe this means that now is the perfect time for people to pick up this book–when they’re feeling their angriest, when the elections are only so far away, when they need that extra motivation to resist.

I certainly think so.

SEPTEMBER WRAP UP!

Wow, this month flew by so fast. September was a busy month filled with so many unexpected things, mostly challenging, but overall, I found ways to have fun here and there! I wanted to start doing some monthly favorites/wrap up posts, and why not start now, with October on the horizon? 🙂

Let’s start with my reading! This month, I read five books:

• THE INCENDIARIES by R.O. Kwon
• GIVE ME YOUR HAND by Megan Abbott
• AWAYLAND: Stories by Ramona Ausubel
• BITCH PLANET, Volumes 1 and 2 by Kelly Sue DeConnick
• VOX by Christina Dalcher (review coming soon!)

My favorite of these, by far, was VOX, a dystopian novel set in a not-too-distant America, after a fundamentalist Christian president is elected and beings enacting laws that limit women and LGTBQIA+ people. Women are prevented from speaking more than 100 words per day, are removed from the workforce, and cannot read or write. It’s an incredibly chilling novel–in my opinion, more terrifying than HANDMAID’S TALE. 

I guess this is a good place to say that I read VOX during a particularly difficult time in the month for me. The past few days have been emotionally taxing because I have been all but glued to the television through the Brett Kavanaugh hearings. Watching as a sharp, intelligent woman with a harrowing story was asked questions designed to demean the trauma she survived, hearing senators denounce her as a liar, waiting for a vote to occur and seeing the ultimately unsatisfying end made me want to find a world I could delve into to process this, so I went to the library and grabbed VOX as soon as I saw it on the new reads shelf. Maybe it didn’t seem like my best possible pick at first–something that explores women literally not having voices–but I was able to go through my feelings of rage along with the narrator as I tore through this book, and it was just what I needed. I won’t go much farther into this, because I really want to give you guys a full review, but I couldn’t go without mentioning this powerful book.

I moved into my first apartment this month, and for the entirety of the month, I was looking for jobs. This gave me a lot of time to do some little self-care things to de-stress. I went to the library often, I wrote a ton for a personal project, and I got back into coloring. I broke out my Prismacolors that I was gifted to by my boyfriend a while back and my Boss Babes coloring book, also a gift from one of my very best friends and fellow boss babe, Leah.

I’ve always been a really creative person. I draw and paint a lot, but I’ve been really uninspired lately on that front and unable to get the ideas in my head to connect with a blank page. Coloring has given me the ability to not think too much about that while working on techniques and finding something meditative to do. Plus, I get to color in pictures of my favorite women, like Gloria Steinem and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. 😉

I also got back into one of my favorite shows from my childhood this month: Avatar: The Last Airbender. As soon as I heard about the plans to bring the show to Netflix in a live action format (with the original creators and the promise of an ethnically-accurate cast, THANK GOD), I had the urge to get back into this incredible story. One of my favorite episodes is, of course, one where the characters visit an ancient library. Because, yes, I’m incredibly predictable.

Avatar feels so much like home to me. I know and love the characters and the incredibly well-written story that can be as thoughtful and dark as it is funny and light. I’m about halfway through season 2 already, so I’ll be finishing the series soon and probably going through Legend of Korra while I’m on a roll!

I don’t usually do monthly TBRs, but I figured I would give it a go for October. I read some pretty creepy books in September, and I want to really focus on that genre leading up to Halloween, so I’ve picked a few books that have been sitting on my shelves with creepy themes!

• THE FEVER by Megan Abbott, in which “[the] panic unleashed by a mysterious contagion threatens the bonds of family and community in a seemingly idyllic suburban community,” according to Goodreads. I’m thinking Salem witch trials meets the girls of LeRoy, NY.
• BURIAL RITES by Hannah Kent, the story of the first woman sentenced to death for murder in Iceland.
• A GOOD AND HAPPY CHILD by Justin Evans, which is, according (again) to Goodreads, “A psychological thriller in the tradition of Donna Tartt’s The Secret History–with shades of The Exorcist.”

And so beings the new month! Hope you guys have enjoyed my little wrap up, and I can’t wait to get into the spooky season!

Until later, readers!

Kristen