THE ECHO WIFE by Sarah Gailey – Review

I received this book for free from the Publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

THE ECHO WIFE by Sarah Gailey – ReviewThe Echo Wife by Sarah Gailey
Published by Tor Books on February 16 2021
Genres: Adult, Science fiction
Pages: 256
Format: ARC
Source: Publisher
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four-half-stars

The nitty-gritty: The Echo Wife is a twisty, emotional and intimate look at the relationship between a human and her clone replica.

Sarah Gailey is one of those writers who never writes the same book twice. This is my fifth Gailey book, and once again I’m surprised by how unique each of their books is. The Echo Wife is a twisty sci-fi story about clones, more of a psychological character study than a thriller, although parts of it can be classified as such. The story is told from Dr. Evelyn Caldwell’s point of view, as she has reached the pinnacle of her professional career, but at the same time she is dealing with some devastating changes in her personal life. Gailey intertwines these two lives—personal and professional—into a fascinating tale that deals with the moral issues of cloning.

When the story begins, Dr. Evelyn Caldwell has just accepted a prestigious award for her work in human cloning. Specifically, she has developed a method of writing a person’s personality into the framework of an adult clone, after years of focusing on her career instead of her marriage. Unfortunately, her husband Nathan is tired of coming in second to Evelyn’s career, and he’s decided to move on to a woman who is interested in starting a family with him, something Evelyn never wanted. But the woman Nathan wants to marry instead isn’t just any woman—she’s a clone of Evelyn herself. Nathan has programmed Martine to be everything that Evelyn isn’t—docile, obedient and most importantly, someone with a fierce desire to become a mother.

But one day Evelyn gets a frantic call from Martine, asking for help. When she arrives at the house, she’s horrified to see Nathan dead on the floor, surrounded by a pool of blood. Martine claims he tried to kill her and it was self defense, but Evelyn knows she and Martine are going to have to figure out how to cover up his death. After all, Martine isn’t actually a person, and getting the police involved would be suicide for Evelyn’s career.

So Evelyn and Martine are in a boat load of trouble, made worse by the fact that Martine is pregnant, something that Evelyn swears is impossible. The focus of the story is on Evelyn and Martine, who are trying to figure out all sorts of things: how to dispose of the body, how to keep Nathan’s demise from being found out, and what to do when they get caught executing their plan. This was such a good story, and while on the surface it appears to have all the ingredients of a fast-paced thriller, it was actually a slower, more thoughtful character study of Evelyn and how she deals with Martine as they are forced to work together to solve their problems. 

There are very few characters in this story, which I appreciated, having read so many books lately with a cast of characters I couldn’t keep track of. The story is tightly focused on Evelyn and Martine and their relationship, and I loved the way Gailey showed how uncomfortable this relationship was. As cold and unfriendly as Evelyn seems, she cannot turn her back on Martine when she asks for help. She is, after all, the exact twin of Evelyn, even though she was made to be Evelyn’s replacement. Evelyn sees herself in Martine, not only in her outward appearance, but in the way Martine is breaking free of the constraints Nathan put on her and becoming her own person. Evelyn is terrified by that, but as a scientist she’s fascinated as well. We also meet a character named Seyed, Evelyn’s lab assistant, whose presence adds quite a bit of drama to the story. Seyed is yet another example of Evelyn’s struggle to maintain relationships, and I liked his character a lot. 

Evelyn tends to go off on tangents as the story progresses, and while this might bother some readers, I absolutely loved these sections. We get glimpses into Evelyn’s childhood and explanations about why she’s so focused on her career and why she keeps people at arm’s length. Gailey doesn’t come out and say it, but Evelyn’s parents were clearly having issues which involved abuse of some kind. Because Evelyn was sent to a boarding school at thirteen, she never really connected with her mother after that, and so we see what happened through the eyes of a child who never had an adult explains things to her. I loved this perspective and thought it added a bit of ominous tension to the story, especially when Evelyn sees parallels between the past and present. There are some shocking scenes in both timelines that literally involve buried secrets, which I thought was a clever way to tie the past and present together.

There were a couple of plot holes in the story that sort of bugged me, although I ultimately shrugged them off because I was enjoying the rest of the story so much. My biggest issue was Martine’s baby, which at the end of the day turned out to be little more than a prop. Gailey doesn’t go into much detail about the specifics of Martine’s pregnancy, although she throws in a few scenes like having to go to the doctor because she starts bleeding. But considering the baby is “impossible,” according to Evelyn, I wanted to know more about her. Is she a clone? Or is she human? Or half and half? (human father clone mother combo?) Unfortunately those questions are never answered, although I get it: the baby really isn’t the focus here, although I was certainly curious!

I also had questions about the cloning process, which Gailey does a pretty good job of explaining. It seems to me like it would take a lot longer to clone a full grown adult than the few weeks it takes in the story, and the whole clandestine operation that Evelyn and Martine undertake seems to fly under everyone else’s radar and felt a little too easy at times.

The tension rises as Evelyn starts to unravel, little by little. I loved this slow slide into madness as Evelyn and Martine must figure out how to solve their terrible problems and move forward after everything that’s happened. The combination of complex relationships, slowly building tension and an examination of the ethics of cloning make The Echo Wife a unique psychological thriller that I highly recommend.

Big thanks to the publisher for providing a review copy.

Posted February 8, 2021 by Tammy in 4 1/2 stars, Reviews / 45 Comments

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45 responses to “THE ECHO WIFE by Sarah Gailey – Review”

  3. todd

    It’s great to see how much you enjoyed this one. The topics are fascinating so I’m curious to try it. It reminds me of an independent film I watched a while back that wasn’t about clones, exactly, but surrogates of a sort. That one took the perspective of a single mother unable to make ends meet to take care of her daughter so she goes back to her former employer and agrees to be a test subject in their surragate program, after which the company will take care of her daugther and fund here education. The catch, though, is that the process of embuing the surrogate with life results in her death as an individual, and the surrogate won’t be exactly like her. It will look different and ends up being/feeling different. I think it transferred some of her personality/memories, but she’ll develop as a different person after that. So we get to see how the daughter reacts when she meets her “new” mother and learns what happened, and how her mother is now gone, changed. Yes, her mother did it for her, but now she’s lost her mother, so was it worth it? Well, sorry for the tangent, but it’s fun when one story reminds me of another. But I wish the movie had been better, which is one reason I’m curious about this book, since it sounds like a better told story. Thanks for the review.

    Reply
      • todd

        At first I couldn’t remember the name, but I found it: Advantageous. From 2015. I wanted the film to be better, but I guess the story, itself, did stick with me. If you watch it I hope you enjoy it (though it isn’t a happy movie), and I apologize if my memory of the story is off. 🙂

        Reply
  5. Susy's Cozy World

    Oh my, I think I have to reconsider my ideas on this book. I was not interested in it, even if I have read some interesting things about it and there is a lot of hype around it but I wasn’t interested, but now… I am not a big fan of tension but this seems intriguing. And just the other evening I was talking with my boyfriend about clone and ethics and it seems like a sign!! And what you wrote about the characters and the development of their relationship sound good!

    Reply
  7. sjhigbee

    This sounds like a fascinating premise – Gailey has a talent for writing about some really intriguing setups. I recall her books about the Wild West with hippo ranches… And finding herself sharing her spouse with her clone sounds like a really interesting idea. BUT the notion that the baby was just thrown in and not fully explored would drive me CRAZY. So while I’m tempted, I think I will rely on your superb review to give me the ins and outs of this one, Tammy:)).

    Reply
      • Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

        I just came back and re-read your review, now that I’ve finished! You hit the nail on the head — great review! And I agree about the baby — it’s the one plot thread that felt a little unfinished to me. With all of Evelyn’s emphasis that it should have been impossible, how did Nathan (who wasn’t nearly as smart as Evelyn) figure out how to make it work?

        Reply
  13. Lisa @ waytoofantasy

    Oooh, I looooooove your review for this. I have been curious about this one for a while, since I first saw it announced, and I’m glad that it didn’t disappoint. I think I’ll have to check this one out for sure. 🙂

    Reply
  14. Jordan @ Forever Lost in Literature

    I also really appreciated the focus on just a few characters rather than a huge cast. I am one of those that didn’t care for the tangents, haha, but I definitely agree that they helped connect a lot of things about Evelyn! I’m so glad you enjoyed this one!

    Reply

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