Vox by Christina Dalcher

Imagine if you were restricted, by law, to just 100 words a day. You aren't allowed a job, a career, of any kind. Your money is controlled by someone else and your privileges as a member of society have been reduced to daily tasks and chores only.

In Christina Dalcher's debut, this is the reality of the new America and the life women are forced to live when an evangelical-led government comes into power and decides it's time for a change.

Jean lives in this reality. She can recall a time when this wasn't the case - when she was allowed to speak as much as she wanted, when she held a job she was proud of, when she didn't have to constantly worry about her own daughter facing the painful consequences of speaking too many words in one day. And Jean is a linguist, so she worries about the overall effect this limit will have on her daughter as she grows, not just in terms of changing social norms but in terms of education and development. 

But for now, this is Jean's reality. 

And then things change. Jean's expertise is requested by none other than the president himself, giving Jean the bargaining chip she needs to garner some bit of freedom for herself and her daughter. But she soon learns that her own freedom will come at great cost. 

This book. This book! Yes, it's one of those reads. The kind that shakes you to the core. The kind that's all too close to reality. The kind that gives you the chance to see just how something so horrific and previously unimaginable could actually happen. And it's terrifying, to be totally honest!

I liked this book in the same way that I liked The Handmaid's Tale, which is to say that experience reading it was tempered by the constant and overriding fear that this could indeed one day happen. And we'd all like to say, never. Or at least, never hear. And yet...

Vox is a great read if for no reason other than it will get people talking. TALKING! So even if you're potentially turned off by the fact that it definitely does hit a bit too close to home these days, it is absolutely thought provoking and may even get people thinking about just how close to a precipice we are and what we need to to do make sure something like this never happens!