BINGO – Scandal
Evelyn, famed geneticist and ground-breaking scientist, discovers that her husband is leaving her for– well, her. A clone of her at least named Martine that her ex-husband created using her own research. A clone that should just be a tool used for a specific purpose and not something that should be treated like a human being. And yet, Martine the clone exists and operates in the world as a fully formed person, and Martine the clone has done something else that shouldn’t be possible: she’s gotten pregnant. Complicating things even further, Evelyn’s ex-husband is dead. The police can’t get involved because Evelyn’s research funding and scientific reputation would be ruined by the scandal if the world found out that a clone can become pregnant. So Evelyn and Martine take matters into their own hands, for better or for worse.
This was a lovely domestic/scientific thriller. Every moment was teetering on disaster for everyone involved. Each decision that the characters made felt charged and full of potential. Not a single moment felt wasted including the flashbacks to Evelyn’s childhood. These vignettes into the terror that Evelyn’s father instilled in his wife, the fear that Evelyn’s mother felt, and the effects that household had on Evelyn as an adult all ratcheted up the internal tension within Evelyn.
I listened to this novel as an audiobook from Audible narrated by Xe Sands. She did a wonderful job of ever so slightly modifying the character voices of Evelyn and Martine. One is a clone of the other, so they spoke fairly similarly. And yet, Sands made each speaking voice distinct. It was easy to follow who was speaking throughout the entire novel.
