'Vox' by Christina Dalcher


WE WILL NOT BE SILENCED

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...

[100 WORD LIMIT REACHED]


Never before has the phrase "Choose your words carefully" mattered so much as it does in this novel. Vox is a feminist speculative thriller, that starts slap-bang in the middle of a terrifying dystopian future. All of the women and girls in America have been fitted with metal wrist counters that deliver an electric shock if the wearer goes above their limit of 100 spoken words a day. The more words spoken over the limit, the higher the voltage. Women are deprived of pens and paper, books, bank accounts, jobs, and education on a par with that given to men and boys. Any offenders are punished in horribly brutal ways by the governing far right Christian fundamentalists.

Our protagonist is Jean McClellan, a former researcher in cognitive linguistics. Jean, forced into the role of housewife by the new regime, is approached by a sinister priest/cult leader, who wishes for her and her former team to restore the power of speech to the President's brother. Prior to the nationwide silencing, Jean had been researching aphasia - an impairment of language, affecting the production or comprehension of speech and the ability to read or write. Aphasia is always due to injury to the brain, most commonly from a stroke. What the preacher wants from Jean is an anti-aphasia serum.In return for her services, Jean's counter is taken off her wrist.

I had been looking forward to getting my hands on a copy of Vox for ages. I really liked the concept of feminist rebellion fiction. The bright red, angry word on the cover called out to me like a rallying cry. You can imagine my joy therefore on Christmas Day when I unwrapped my copy.

The best word to sum up Christina Dalcher's debut novel is divisive. One cannot deny that it is highly topical, riding the coattails of Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale like a moth. It has all the elements of a thriller, even including a Hollywood-style shoot-out in a secret laboratory. It is a highly popular novel, with no clear genre.

It is very hard to ignore the topical references, so much so that for a while I wondered whether this novel falls into the social commentary genre. A new President takes office and a far right, ultra-conservative movement takes over. One moment that stood out for me is the part where Jean recalls the time when her passport becomes invalid:
It didn't take long for the authorities to set up checkpoints, and the wall separating Southern California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas from Mexico itself had already been built...
The US imprisons its citizens in their own country. The Bible Belt morphs into a nationwide sarcophagus. Children are indoctrinated into the new fundamentalism with promises of university for the boys. The horror of these ideas is how familiar they might seem to the reader.

Jean's daughter Sonia is six years old. At a crucial age for language development and reading skills, she is instead only being taught sewing and basic arithmetic at school. The truly horrifying moment arrives when Jean realises that the school is handing out prizes to girls who can remain silent the longest. Sonia is shown as a sweet child in direct contrast to her older brother Steven, who quickly becomes enthralled by the Pure Movement and whom Jean finds infuriating. At points in the novel, Jean has to remind herself, 'I don't hate my son, I don't hate my son, I don't hate my son'. Thus, Dalcher shows the reader how easily familial relationships can become embroiled with politics.

Narrated entirely by Jean, the story focuses on her present and recent past. Dalcher relies heavily on interior monologue. The reader sees through Jean's words how the totalitarian regime set in. Jean blames herself for not recognising the warning signs and feels that her own failure has contributed to the downfall of society. I found this a bit self-involved, but then realised that everyone has felt this way themselves. The guilt experienced by voters when politics goes wrong can feel very personal, even though they themselves are not responsible.

Jean is not a likeable protagonist. Her behaviour is inherently selfish; she treats her (admittedly one-dimensional) husband Patrick with contempt, preferring the company of her Italian colleague Lorenzo (so cliche!). Furthermore, Patrick is mild-mannered while Lorenzo is aggressive (this is beginning to sound like Mills&Boon). She repeatedly puts herself in danger. She openly prefers her daughter to her other children. By the end of the book, she shows no signs of character development. Yet, perhaps, it is for the best to have her as the protagonist, precisely because she is passionate, intelligent, and unwilling to compromise. She is a good person to have in a revolution.

To paraphrase heavily, "All it takes for evil to triumph is for good people to say nothing". According to Jean, "the apology in his eyes is hard to miss, but speaking up has never been Patrick's strong suit". It therefore falls to the women, the ones being forcibly silenced, to speak up. Vox is heavy-handed in places where subtlety would make more of an impact. However, this may be a point made by Christina Dalcher. Women have been suffering oppression for centuries. It is unlikely that, when the time comes to finally speak out, they would be meek and quiet. Women should be making their voices heard, turning and facing their oppressors with a shout of defiance.

In conclusion, Vox is a great book about language, silence, and communication. This is a highly vocal novel, following well in the vein of the #MeToo movement, doing a fine job at building up a sense of injustice in a patriarchal society. I really enjoyed all of the anger and aggression because it captured the very emotion of defiance. Defiance is angry. Yet, despite portraying this anger very well, the ending felt rushed and convenient. I would have preferred it if Dalcher had left things open-ended, and given room for a sequel. It would be disappointing, not to mention ironic, that all of this female anger is pent-up in only one book, especially if the title means voice.

Author's Website ChristinaDalcher.com

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