The Subtweet
2021 Dublin Literary Award Finalist
2021 Lambda Literary Awards Finalist for Transgender Fiction
2020 Toronto Book Awards Finalist
"The Subtweet is affecting, unnerving, empowering, and often truly LOL." -- Foreword Reviews, starred review
"A beautifully crafted novel about race, music, and social media." -- Booklist
Includes an exclusive free soundtrack
Celebrated multidisciplinary artist Vivek Shraya's second novel is a no-holds-barred examination of the music industry, social media, and making art in the modern era, shining a light on the promise and peril of being seen.
Indie musician Neela Devaki has built a career writing the songs she wants to hear but nobody else is singing. When one of Neela's songs is covered by internet artist RUK-MINI and becomes a viral sensation, the two musicians meet and a transformative friendship begins. But before long, the systemic pressures that pit women against one another begin to bear down on Neela and RUK-MINI, stirring up self-doubt and jealousy. With a single tweet, their friendship implodes, a career is destroyed, and the two women find themselves at the centre of an internet firestorm.
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"A beautifully crafted novel about race, music, and social media . . . In this timely novel, Shraya speaks to a modern audience with bold cultural insight, confronting the difficulties of being a brown artist and the drastic impact social media can have on pop culture." -- Booklist
"Vivek Shraya's The Subtweet is a sharp, encompassing story . . . A piercing satire played out against diverse creative energies, The Subtweet is affecting, unnerving, empowering, and often truly LOL." -- Foreword Reviews, starred review
"It is clear that Shraya is pouring everything she's learned from years of writing and making music into a text that combines rhythm and deft technique in bitingly original ways. It is equally clear in The Subtweet that Shraya is using the vehicle of fiction to hash out many of the valid frustrations she's accumulated over years of navigating the Canadian culture scene . . . Shraya skilfully shows this complexity by depicting characters who are frequently ridiculous, petty, and even malicious, while simultaneously pushing readers to understand the underlying systemic factors driving their frustrating actions." -- Quill & Quire
"The Subtweet takes the topic of online life and allows it to become simply part of the lives of its fully human, complex characters. What emerges is a deeply moving tale about the relationships between artists and friends. Biting and beautiful, it's written with heart by an essential voice." -- Jonny Sun, author of Everyone's a Aliebn When Ur a Aliebn Too
"Complex female friendship! Making art as a woman of color! The double-edged sword of being visible! What more could you want?" -- Book Riot
