The Echo Wife

The slow drip of dread becomes a tsunami of terror by the last few chapters. Sarah Gailey's writing of a character who is monstrous, aware of her monstrosity, and simultaneously trying to defend herself against even greater monsters all around her is fantastic.

I loved the sense of creeping doom as I unraveled each drip of exposition.

At first I couldn't see how this and Upright Women Wanted could possibly be from the same author, but eventually similar themes around trust, betrayal, and self-loathing/-punishment emerged.

Full disclosure: I was provided an advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I devoured this novel in about 4 sessions. I had enjoyed the author’s previous work Magic For Liars, and was excited when I heard the inspiration for this one was to get Joss Whedon’s Dollhouse “right.” I didn’t know what that meant exactly, but I enjoyed Dollhouse and was excited to see what that meant.

Wow, what a ride. Gailey does an incredible job of putting you into the head of the main character while still keeping key information from the reader until it’s absolutely necessary. The protagonist thinks of herself as an incredibly practical person, but it also becomes clear that it’s because she has had to learn to shield herself from so much, even to the point of lying to herself.

The book does a great job of rewarding you for paying attention. Right about the time I started asking “wait, what about...” as I thought through the implications of this particular situation, the book rose up to answer just those questions. I’m avoiding a lot of details because I don’t want to spoil much, but suffice it to say this book takes a familiar sci-fi trope and follows it to places I didn’t expect, but make perfect sense in retrospect.