A review by sarahmatthews
The Subtweet by Vivek Shraya

reflective tense fast-paced

The Subtweet by Vivek Shraya

Read on audio

Narrator: Nisha Ahuja

ECW Press

Pub. 2020, 235pp

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Neela’s a singer-songwriter who’s well respected but isn’t making a huge living from her career yet. One of her songs is suddenly made wildly popular by Rukmini, an enthusiastic YouTuber who covers her favourite tunes for fun and has nothing to lose. When the cover of Neela’s song goes viral Rukmimi’s as surprised as everyone els. they’re both asian Canadians living in Toronto and a friendship slowly builds.

When Rukmini meets Neela in person for the first time (arranged through a DM on Twitter) she’s starstruck and posts a selfie of then both afterwards. She enjoys the ‘likes’ pouring in, then doubt sets in and she dissects their conversation until she’s filled with paranoia that her followers are only clicking ‘like’ for Neela and ends up deleting the tweet. There are so many moments like this that highlight the temptation we can feel on social media to irrationally compare ourselves to others. One of the biggest strengths of this novel is how the power dynamics between the main characters keeps shifting. At a later point Neela is in awe of Rukmini’s effortless social media presence and she begrudges her large follower count and breezy ability to reach an audience.

This book brilliantly examines the tension in friendships when an element of competition is involved; the misunderstandings and insecurities that fuel resentment.

“with every listen and every share, Everysong felt more like Rukmini’s song and less like Neela’s. Faced with this ongoing and uncontrollable transference, she was trying to let go, but The process of separating herself from her song, her work, felt foreign and uncomfortable.”

As you can imagine from the title, things take a bitter turn when an explosive subtweet goes viral (the type of tweet that then gets quoted in online news articles) and the fallout is explored, allowing the author to discuss issues around racial politics ; how creating a cover version that’s more palatable to white consumers was always going to be a winner and the unfairness of that for the original musician.

This book really got me thinking and was fast paced. It covers a huge range of issues and as a consequence it jumps around a bit and I found myself rewinding at times to catch up with where we were and who’s perspective we were focusing on. 

It was impossible not to compare this novel to Yellowface which I read a couple of months ago, covering similar themes but within the publishing industry. I enjoyed The Subtweet more, I think because Yellowface had a thriller element which I didn’t find convincing.

This book is for anyone interested in online culture, the music industry, questions around authorship of art and friendship. If you’re not a Twitter user it will likely leave you cold.