The Herd by Emily Edwards - Review

Lynn in my book club chose this book for this year, and by coincidence I had already bought it on Kindle when it was only 99p. So I was excited to get to it and read it at the beginning of July. I read it really quickly because it really captured me. I'm not surprised that it was a Richard and Judy book club book because it's just got that vibe to it. It'll be interesting to see what we make of it at book club!

The book is about two families, the Chamberlains and the Kholis. They live on the same street in a place called Farley, which appears to be fairly close to London and has a beach, so maybe like Brighton or something.  Elizabeth and Jack Chamberlain have three children - Max, who's nearly twelve, Charlie, who's about ten, and Clemmie, who is seven. Elizabeth and Bryony have been friends for like twenty years, since they met at uni, and they're extremely close. Bry is married to Ash, and they have a little girl, Alba, who is four. They have a lot of money because Ash sold his businesses. Elizabeth and Jack clearly do have money, but Jack is struggling to keep things going and also really clearly hates his job in the City. 

Clemmie had seizures when she was little so she has not been vaccinated. Elizabeth truly believes in vaccines, and to begin with would check who was hanging out with Clemmie, but she's sort of forgotten about that recently. But there's a bunch of stuff coming up at the end of the school term, so she sends out an email asking for the vaccination status of every child who is coming to Clemmie's party, and asks that if they're not vaccinated, they don't come. 

But Alba is not vaccinated. You see, Bry's older brother Matty is autistic and non verbal, and lives in a home. Their parents are convinced that he became autistic after some of his vaccinations, so they are truly against them. Sara has in front done some protesting and stuff like that. Bryony has spent her whole life with the 'burden' of Matty's existence on her. Her family life has clearly been hard, so she didn't want Alba to be vaccinated. Her younger sister Jessie has just had a baby, Coco, and Bry knows all her mum's arguments as to why Coco shouldn't be vaccinated either.

But she has to lie to her oldest friend. And she does. But then measles breaks out. 

Right from the beginning of the book the reader knows that there is a court case going on, but it's not immediately clear what has happened and who is involved. There are small points of view of a few people who are attending the court case, including reporters, online trolls, and more. 

I generally did like the book and found it very readable and an interesting story. It's easy to sympathise with both Bry and Elizabeth, for different reasons, over different parts of the book. I liked the supporting characters in the street, too. I liked the microcosm of life. I did find everyone insufferably middle class and this is something I would like to discuss in book club because I think it would be different if it wasn't set in such a well to do, affluent street. 

In all I'm giving it four out of five. It was written mostly before the Covid lockdowns, but it is interesting to read it in the light of what we've been through in the last four years, and through the scary rise of antivaxxers both here and in the rest of the world.