Review – The Echo Chamber by John Boyne

Digital Review Copy Details.

• Title: The Echo Chamber
• Author: John Boyne
• Narrator: Richard E. Grant
• Genre: General Fiction
• Source: NetGalley
• Publication Date: 5 August 2021 
• Format: audiobook
• Duration: 14 hours, 38 minutes

A chapter into listening to the wonderful narration by Richard E Grant, I had already surmised the following: The Echo Chamber by John Boyne is a farcical, laugh out loud tale about social media and modern society. Farfetched, sarcastic, preachy in places, I was enjoying it immensely. And not unironically, decided to share my thoughts on social media about it firstly on Twitter and the following day on Facebook

When I got to the end which was a protracted affair due to the vagaries of the NetGalley app. I thought about what had happened and a hell of a lot had, and my thoughts hadn’t changed.

I loved this journey – an expose of a family of ‘characters’ who embodied the worst traits of the privileged elites/media darlings/celebs – leading to a meltdown of epic proportions. To my delight, what could go wrong, did. The coincidences were obvious but funny, nevertheless.

However, the clearly signposted denouement was a hollow reward. The Cleverley family while exposed as treacherous, more so unthinking, oblivious individuals, who coasted on their popularity, were exposed as such and to their horror ‘cancelled’.

But it was clear that whilst fiction, The Echo Chamber mirrors the real world and a few years away from the public eye, a couple of insincere apologies, some grand gesture to those less fortunate and the Cleverley’s would be back. Back on social media tweeting, liking, and following. Promoting themselves and putting others down. And that is disheartening.

Finally, I was thrilled to be introduced to Ustym Karmaliuk the tortoise on the book cover and the stereotyped Ukrainian cast. It made me ever so glad to be listening mostly at home, because those characters in particular made the story laugh out loud in many places.

My thanks to NetGalley, the author and publisher for a copy of this book in return for a candid review.