Book Review :: Speak, by Louisa Hall

Speak by Louisa Hall
ISBN: 9780356506098
Published by Hachette NZ
on February 25th 2016
Genres: Historical Fiction, Science Fiction
Pages: 316
Source: Hachette Publishing NZ
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For fans of David Mitchell and Margaret Atwood comes this poignant novel from Waterstones Book Club author Louisa Hall, with a tale will make readers everywhere question what it really means to be human. Emily St. John Mandel, author of Station Eleven, calls Speak the 'rarest of finds'.

She cannot run. She cannot walk. She cannot even blink. As her batteries run down for the final time, all she can do is speak. Will you listen?

From a pilgrim girl's diary, to a traumatised child talking to a software program; from Alan Turing's conviction in the 1950s, to a genius imprisoned in 2040 for creating illegally lifelike dolls: all these lives have shaped and changed a single artificial intelligence - MARY3. In Speak she tells you their story, and her own. It is the last story she will ever tell, spoken both in celebration and in warning.

When machines learn to speak, who decides what it means to be human?

Last updated on 6 April 2022

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What is Speak by Louisa Hall about?

Speak follows the stories of 5 different characters (or 6…possibly 7). Mary writes in her diary as she travels by boat to the New World; Alan Turing writes letters to his best friend’s mother about his life and the things he’s working on; Karl and Ruth Dettman are falling apart in their marriage; a transcript used in Stephen R. Chinn’s trial shows conversations between Gaby, a young girl and a robot; and Stephen R. Chinn, a computer programmer writes his memoirs in a Texas jail in 2040.

While all the stories seem unconnected, as the story progresses you start to see the links between them, and the artificial intelligence, MARY3, as a connecting point.

My thoughts on Speak by Louisa Hall

It’s a little hard to write about the plot or the settings or any of that because of how the book is written. There isn’t a narrator, other than the individuals who speak their story in some form (diary, letters, online conversations, memoirs), and I guess that’s the point. It was a very thought-provoking book at times, and it definitely got me thinking about communication and how much of that is us being who we are, and how and what makes us truly human. One of my favourite lines is by Gaby, as she lies unable to move in her bedroom, unable to speak.

“Tell me what happens next, after my body has frozen. When I can’t communicate. What will I be?”

At this stage in the story (quite early on) I was really enjoying it. My favourite voice was the conversation between Gaby and MARY3, and while I did enjoy the others at the beginning, as the story went on I did find myself getting bored. I was tired of hearing about Mary on her boat and her insane obsession with her dog, and her weird diary-writing style, and I didn’t care much for many of the other characters.

However, it was a very well written book, and Hall has a great style in all the different voices she writes. I think, while I wouldn’t read it again, I am glad I read it. For me, it just reiterated the fact that making robots that think and talk is a bad idea. It can only go badly. What’s important is people; our thoughts, our fears, our connections with loved ones, our life and eventual death. It’s like that for a reason, and we shouldn’t try to mess with that.

Speak is a great book for people who like A.I. stories, and stories with a multitude of seemingly unconnected characters, spanning centuries. As I said, it’s thought-provoking, educational, and brilliantly written, especially for Hall’s second book.

Have you read Speak? What did you think?

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