⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ This book was fucking good
Utopia PR was a quirky and wonderful confluence of the last four years under a certain U.S. president and a comedic version of George Orwell’s 1984. Blake Hamner (the n is silent) is a public relations wizard, “the government’s go-to guy whenever things go way south.” He’s married to the lovely Maria Worthington, a TV news personality, and the pair have recently put off expanding their family in favor of expanding their careers. Neither is particularly happy about this decision, but Maria is breaking barriers as a newscaster, and Blake wants validation that he’s good enough to play in the big boys' sandbox. Hopelessly optimistic, he finds gratification in trying to contain a president who’s a walking PR disaster. Either he loves his job more than jerking off, or he's a masochistic glutton for punishment, I'm not sure which.
When a PR intern named Victoria downplays a tragic accident wherein the president’s evil robot guard dog rips the throats out of two innocents, “Our Leader” (the delusional narcissistic authoritarian president/singing sensation who rules the US from the “Compound”—there’s no White House in this dystopian world) fires his Press Secretary and promotes Victoria to Communications Director. As his new boss, Victoria humiliates Blake by sending him to clean up ridiculous messes while the president rails against resisters who didn’t vote for him by “calming” them with opioid-laced milk and babbling incessant nonsense on Woozle, a futuristic version of Twitter. Along the way, a mysterious, Batman-like figure called JetPack (who's basically Elon Musk) embarks on a mission to take the president down after several of Our Leader’s enemies disappear (because Elon Musk kidnapped them and forced them to live in Star Trek holodecks he created where they just guzzle booze on beaches and bang each other all day long. Not a bad life, really). The swirl of chaos that follows would be fun to watch if it didn’t overlap so ominously with reality.
In many respects, Oscar Wilde’s quote—“Life imitates art far more than art imitates life”—rings true for this book. After the real-life events of January 6, 2021, it was particularly chilling to read parts where Our Leader tries to manipulate the masses to do his bidding through coercion and oftentimes flat-out threats. Though the story is meant to reveal a caricature of an inept and deeply flawed “leader” elevated to the highest office by a vacuous society consumed by its Romanesque, never-ending thirst for entertainment, it hits closer to home than it should.
I enjoyed Utopia PR and would recommend it to anyone who enjoys satire dressed up in a designer suit cut from the cheap polyester-blend fabric of modern reality.
I received this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.