Meet the Cleverleys, a privileged family with George being a popular presenter on the BBC, Beverly a bestselling author (with a ghost writer), and their three children Nelson, Elizabeth, and Achilles, figuring out how to be in the world. We are introduced to the two parents in learning about the affairs they have been engaged in, while convincing themselves they are loyal to their spouse. This doesn’t give us a great first impression of them. When we meet Nelson he is dressed in scrubs but unwilling to help a man in need of medical attention on the tube. Elizabeth and her boyfriend Wilkes are addicted to growing their social media following, doing charitable works but documenting everything online. Achilles has found a lucrative side hustle (he is still in school) of blackmailing potential sugar daddies, most of whom have far less money than his family. When George trips up in a tweet about a transgender receptionist his decades of carefully curating a liberal persona look to be at risk.
All of the characters in this book are fairly terrible, perhaps with the exception of Nelson, who craves love and lacks confidence. Even the side characters are caricaturish and constantly make bad decisions. I’m not against an unlikeable character but when the entire novel is populated exclusively by unsympathetic, selfish, morally dubious characters it does become difficult to really enjoy what you’re reading. Boyne counters this somewhat with humour, and although this is obviously meant as satire it is so overblown that it loses its power. I was expecting to be challenged by the ills of social media, a topic I’m very open to, but I didn’t leave the book with any insights or really a feeling that the focus was actually on social media. Yes, there are some characters who have a deeply unhealthy relationship with their phones, and cancel culture is examined, but in such a belittling way, where every player is demeaned you’re not left with a strong feeling on where your sympathy is meant to lie. George is the ‘victim’ of cancel culture but he suffers no real consequences. The main message of the book seems to be that if you’re wealthy and powerful you can do what you want. Boyne’s own troubles with social media criticism may be fuelling some of his disdain for keyboard warriors. Elizabeth has two Twitter accounts, her personal one, and a secret one in which she attacks everyone and anyone without distinction. Indeed, she also sends vile messages to her friends and family, and it is her response that makes George’s tweet go viral. I don’t think many of us really believe pile-ons are a good thing, but Boyne’s disdain for ‘woke’ and anyone who questions the old order feels very dismissive. This is especially reinforced because we repeatedly see those pretending to be wounded that their liberalism is being questioned espousing offensive views outside of the public eye. His attacks on incidental characters also feel unnecessarily mean.
Boyne attempts to link in social media further by using flashbacks to happier times for the Cleverleys, ending with a note on which social media platform was being launched at the time, as though this is linked to the paths their lives take, except he doesn’t demonstrate this. Indeed, it is only really Twitter and some Instagram that is used to any great effect throughout the novel, so the creation of Facebook or TikTok etc is even more irrelevant. Of course it’s all tied, but there is no demonstration that the root cause of the family’s shortcomings is social media or smart phones. It seems more to be their sense of self-importance and the knowledge that their positions give them free reign to do as they please. Even the epilogue which is presumably meant to show how much happier life is away from phones doesn’t really show anything more than that there are no real consequences for them for their bad behaviour.
The characters are all seemingly interlinked, often through Pylyp, former Strictly Come Dancing partner to Beverly, the man she’s having an affair with, as has most of her family. The fact some of them would have been underage at the time is completely swept aside, as is Elizabeth’s passing comment about the unhealthy sexual relationships she’s been in in the past. Every time a new character is introduced you wonder how they will fit into this broader story. Initially this was quite interesting, it did become a little tiresome after a while, and then toward the end there is one final link in the chain that you don’t see coming. Pylyp also brings in a character which for many may be their favourite - the tortoise Ustym Karmaliuk. When he goes back to Ukraine to visit family he leaves the tortoise with Beverly, with strict instructions on how to care for him. Considering her lack of care for her children and work, you can imagine how well this goes.
At times I did enjoy this book and raced through it. The characters and the way they act can feel so outrageous at times that it is funny, and I was interested to find out what would happen next. Some of the connections between characters were intriguing and it was interesting to see how they played out. It lost me a bit toward the end and I think it was probably because literally every character that was introduced, whether for a scene or for the duration were just not nice people, and often for seemingly no reason. We can see that the Cleverley children have been somewhat neglected by their parents and have had to find their own way through the challenges of the teenage years and young adulthood. It is not touched on often but in passing we are told that Nelson has never felt safe and loved, that Elizabeth has experienced difficulties in relationships, and has turned to social media for validation and a sense of being. George and Beverly are openly rude about people they don’t like, and make no secret of which of their children they like best and what they think their shortcomings are. They want their children to move out but don’t stop to consider that perhaps they haven’t prepared them with the skills they need to succeed in the world. There are a lot of potentially interesting avenues this book could have gone down but Boyne chooses not to. The satire is too widely spread to have much of an impact and the characters feel like shallow stereotypes so you’re not really invested. Again, for me, Nelson was the exception. If you’re new to Boyne I would recommend trying one of his other books.
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