Use It Or You Lose It: Christina Dalcher’s ‘Vox’

‘“Not your fault,” Lorenzo says.

But it is. And my fault didn’t start when I signed Morgan’s contract on Thursday. My fault started two decades ago, the first time I didn’t vote, the umpteenth time I told Jackie I was too busy to go on one of her marches or make posters or call my congressmen.’

Christina Dalcher’s debut novel Vox is narrated by Jean McClellan, a forty-four-year-old wife and mother of four (three boys and one girl). Religious fundamentalism has swept through the United States; what was once merely a Bible ‘Belt’ is now a ‘full bodysuit,’ which reaches all the way to Hawaii. A new president has been elected and one of his closest advisors is Reverend Carl Corbin, the figurehead of the ‘Pure’ movement. Since the election, various changes have been implemented. Women are no longer allowed to work or have bank accounts, to study biology or physics, or to read. Men keep the economy afloat, whilst women have no choice but to be homemakers. Homosexuals have been rounded up and are confined with members of the opposite sex until they come around to the ‘proper way of thinking.’ Premarital and extramarital sex have heavy consequences (only for women, of course) and supermarket shelves, which were once stocked with birth control, now offer only baby food. So far, this is all in keeping with every other contemporary feminist dystopia. However, what sets Vox apart is that all women and girls have been fitted with counters that limit them to 100 spoken words a day. Individuals that exceed their daily quota are shocked with a thousand volts of electricity.

This means that Jean, a former cognitive linguist who specialised in aphasia (the loss of language), is now a ‘woman of few words’… that is until the president’s brother sustains a severe head injury and the president is desperate to find a cure.

This novel’s striking premise is bolstered by Dalcher’s excellent writing style. Jean is a reasonably likeable protagonist and has an engaging inner life. Moreover, I like how readers get to know what she is like not only as a mother, but also as a daughter, a friend, and a wife. Dalcher’s thought-provoking attention to detail showcases her talent as a writer – she gives voice to how a mother would feel about not being able to read her children bedtime stories, how these changes would impact Jean’s attitude towards the men in her life, how her daughter’s drawings would feature their wrist counters, and even how that those magnetic words that can be arranged on fridges to make silly sentences would be a thing of the past.

I was also impressed that Dalcher considered how the regime would entice young people. In the story, the government provides incentives to encourage young men to get married before they turn eighteen – money paid to them upfront, their university tuition fees paid in full, a guaranteed graduate job, and ten-thousand-pounds for every child they have. Given our current fiercely competitive job market and the cost of attending university, it is not too hard to accept how these propositions could appear attractive. Furthermore, a new scheme has been introduced in primary schools – prizes are awarded to the girl who says the fewest words a day. It is interesting to see how Jean’s children respond differently to these changes. Jean’s seventeen-year-old son, Steven, is a firm believer in the Pure movement until a girl he wishes to marry is severely punished for breaking the regime’s rules. In contrast, Jean’s daughter, Sonia, was only five when the new president was elected and consequently accepts the new as normal. One day, she comes home and is elated at having won the prize for speaking the least at school – a nauseating detail, which packs a punch.

Unfortunately, there were a few things that let this book down for me. Firstly, Vox is peppered with inconsistencies and implausible details (implausible even for speculative fiction) which somewhat detract from the novel’s potency. I was quite shocked by Jean’s outspokenness, after her wrist counter is temporarily removed when she agrees to help the president. Although Jean’s boldness means that she is a character that you can get behind, the fact that she brazenly insults authority figures yet faces no ramifications seemed incongruous. After all, in this fictional world, women who misbehave are often shipped off to manual labour camps and have their word counters permanently set to zero. Moreover, the removal of Jean’s counter, which should have been a monumental moment, felt rather anti-climactic. Her family barely reacted, which I found implausible. One of her sons nonchalantly remarked that it was ‘weird’ hearing their mum talk so much. A quick Google search suggests that women speak approximately 20,000 words a day, which means that 100 words equates to a meagre 0.5 per cent of this. Therefore, I think experiencing their mother suddenly having an unlimited number of words at her disposal would startle her family to say the least. I also was not convinced that Sonia, Jean’s extremely timid six-year-old, would go from speaking less than forty words a day to being suddenly loquacious after having her counter taken off (one of the conditions the president agrees to, in exchange for Jean attempting to find a cure for his brother’s loss of speech). I also thought that Jean brushed off certain moral dilemmas far too easily. For example, there is a bit in the novel where Jean is contemplating leaving her sons behind (with their father) and moving to Italy with her daughter so that they can have a better life. This monumental dilemma is weighed up by Jean as if she’s considering something quite trivial, like whether to have a cheese or a ham sandwich for lunch!

Notwithstanding these issues, my greatest problem with the novel is actually its plot. After you pass the halfway mark, there is a rather abrupt acceleration in pace. Events start to become hazy, which makes it quite hard to keep up with what is going on. Initially, I wasn’t sure if this was just a ‘me’ problem but, after skimming through numerous other reviews on Goodreads, this seems to be a relatively common complaint. Furthermore, the novel’s ending tied everything up far too neatly for my liking. I didn’t feel that there needed to be a ‘happily ever after’ and I think a different, less ‘fairytale’ conclusion would have been more effective.

Overall, I would rate Vox 3.5/5 stars. I loved Dalcher’s writing style and, with a stronger second half, this novel would definitely have been a solid 4/5 stars. Nonetheless, this is a really thought-provoking read and I would recommend Vox to others.