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What's often positioned as "My child, my choice" is quite clearly ignoring that not every child or parent has the right to exercise that choice. Elizabeth's daughter has an illness which means she should not be vaccinated and her parents have to rely on the herd immunity around them to keep Clementine safe. On the face of it it is a story about differences of opinions centred around vaccinations but I actually think it is a much bigger story than that, it is about friendships and relationships but ultimately it is about being a parent, how complicated that can be and how it makes everyone feel differently. I also enjoy some contemporary fiction, literary fiction and romance with a smattering of non-fiction. On the face of it, the book sounded right up my street, but the when reading it just felt very flat.
An insular group of well-groomed women becomes drawn into investigating the murder of one of their own, all the while keeping scandalous personal secrets tightly sealed behind their persimmon pink-stained lips. Elizabeth and husband Jack’s youngest child, Clemmie, is about to turn seven but due to seizures as a baby, and on the advice of her doctor, she wasn’t able to have the standard childhood vaccinations and, as such, relies on those around her being immunised for her own protection.The book begins with a courtcase but we don’t know any details of what has happened at this stage except that a tragic event has occured resulting in a very public courtcase.
The Herd is on the surface a story that examines whether a parent's choice on whether to vaccinate their child is valid when if they choose not to, they risk harm to other's who don't have that choice. I could have done without the first chunk of getting to know both characters and the side characters around them for that long. The only way forward in the end is to have the courage to dip the paintbrush in the water, to swirl the bristles and clear the the murky brown to decide which bright, bold colour to paint the beginnings of a new picture. It feels honest, fair, and doesn't shy away from any of the arguments frequently thrown up about vaccines (f*** Andrew Wakefield, seriously).
I didn’t understand exactly how this was going to pan out for me as it was close to what’s happening in the U. It was actually the character of Rosalyn who appeared strongly to me first, because I think she is an aspirational woman: she lives her life how she chooses without apology. A woman with glossy French-braid pigtails and molded spectacles smiled at me from behind a marble-fronted desk. They’re the best of friends, and godmothers to each other’s daughters – because they trust that the safety of their children is both of their top priority. And they ended up having a really tense argument in the garden about this and I just felt so conflicted.
On the wall behind her was the now-famous logo: The HERD, the H-E-R a deep plum, the other letters gray. g.; the uptight 'control freak' and the free-wheelin' hippie, the writing syrupy, and the text filled with ridiculous tropes, e.The publication of this book is very timely as it could be said to have a correlation with the current COVID vaccine debate we are all experiencing. She now lives in Lewes, East Sussex with her endlessly patient husband and her two endlessly energetic young sons. I enjoyed this fiction book based on two families with differing opinions on vaccinating their children with devastating consequences. Eleanor is a chic postfeminist dynamo, or, as the clever Katie thinks of her: “Entrepreneur Barbie: shiny brown hair in mermaid curls, skin dewy, eyes clear.
Close friends and now neighbours, they’re godmothers to one another’s daughters, and have found a way to balance each of their differences, except on one big issue - vaccinating their daughters. I like how the author never presented this as good vs bad because, like most things, it's more complex than that. Emily Edwards has effectively and compassionately raised awareness for not just one side of this 'debate', but both which I will always say is an extremely hard concept to master. It also reminds me of Jodi Picoult and Liane Moriarty books so much that every time it reminded me that the book was set in the UK, I had to remind myself it wasn't them. With very different views on vaccinations, Bry tells a small white lie - completely unaware of impact that lie is going to have.At a time when the Covid-19 vaccine debate is raging, Emily Edwards even-handed and emotive family drama tackles another just as hotly contested vaccination debate with its focus on those given exclusively to children. The Herd” isn’t as sharply drawn as Liane Moriarty’s best-seller-turned-HBO-series, but it rests on the same formula.
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