This feels like an incredibly timely book, with the results of the recent US election still baffling left-leaning people around the world!

Rigorously researched and compellingly argued, this account of one woman’s delve beyond the echo chamber and into the ‘mirror world’ of alternative facts and ‘fake news’ is dense with actual facts, references and relevant information.

Naomi Klein starts by trying to understand Other Naomi (Wolf)’s change of political allegiance, but the book soon becomes a journey through political ‘othering’ as a distraction from the evils of capitalism, encompassing Covid and lockdowns, vaccine mandates, slavery, the Holocaust, colonialism, anti-Semitism generally, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict – to name just a few of the topics discussed in this wide-reaching examination of human behaviour.

And Naomi’s explanations really did help me to better understand why, like Other Naomi, people might be feeling ‘othered’, fearful or angry at their position in their society which might lead them to lash out at the apparently smug and cliquey left and feel welcomed by the projection of confidence and camaraderie from the right. From that moment of personal epiphany, Klein moves on to discuss that wider history of human othering and the wilful blindness to what she calls the Shadow Lands, that props up our capitalist comfort and helped to lead us to this divisive current point.

In this narrative, acts like the Holocaust and the slave trade are reframed as part of a wider pattern rather than the usual view that they represent horrifying outliers in our shared history, and it shows how focusing on the specific details of individual atrocities (race, religion, country, method, motivation) blinds us to a wider picture of humans reducing other humans to lower status and then treating them as animals, objects or disposable.

Those benefitting from this status quo are adept at distracting us by setting us at each other’s throats, giving us easy ‘othered’ targets, thus avoiding us looking at their power structures that grind us all ruthlessly in the name of profit. Just think of that meme with the plates of cookies!

Klein then pans wider still to look at the climate crisis and the impending end of humanity, before finishing full-circle, back in the small and personal with her relationship with her own doppelganger, and how her perspective has changed over time and over the course of writing and researching this book.

This is a deep, intense analysis that requires time, thought, conscious and active engagement with the ideas, an open mind and the bravery to face the worst in yourself and others with a will to do better. Throughout the writing, the author remains reasonable and balanced and is also willing to examine and deconstruct her own assumptions and prejudices, so the ideal reader for this book is anyone who is ready to do the same.

Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World
By Naomi Klein
Allen Lane
Naomi Klein is a Canadian author, activist and feminist who is fed up with constantly being mistaken for another outspoken writer, Naomi Wolf.
It wasn’t so bad in the early 1990s, when Wolf was best known as the author of feminist bestseller The Beauty Myth but in recent years she’s undergone a distinct ideological shift. Where once she was an advisor to former US president Bill Clinton, now she’s fervent supporter of America’s alt-right and has been sharing all kinds of crackpot conspiracy theories including equating Covid-related health measures to Nazism.
For poor Klein, being constantly confused with “the other Naomi” – as she refers to Wolf – is no longer just an annoyance, it’s also deeply embarrassing.
In this book she examines Wolf’s radical transformation from liberal thinker to right-wing spreader of crazy misinformation that at one point got her banned from social media platforms. It’s not an attack on Wolf. Rather what Klein is aiming to do is to look at the far right through the lens of her doppelganger – and in so doing, identify her own blind spots.

This was an interesting discussion on identity, social media and conspiracies. I didnt manage to get all the way through this as i was in a bit of a reading slump at the time, but may go back to it in the future.

Wasn't sure what to expect from this - but it's both an interesting insight into the challenges of confusing identities online alongside an interesting commentary on the state of the social media world

I'm not sure why anyone felt this book needed to be written.

"There's another woman on the internet with my first name and some people like her more than they like me. Here's why that's wrong. Also, the left should stop making fun of the right. But also, anti-vaxxers are a bit like nazis."

Every time a book mentions the amount of likes a tweet got, an angel loses its wings.

Did not finish — I couldn’t get into this book and therefore won’t be posting about it on my socials.

What a ride! This is my favourite type of non-fiction, where an author takes a relatively small and specific incident, often personal, and uses it to illuminate huge and complex themes.

I became aware of the Naomi Klien/Naomi Wolff conundrum that sparked this book during Covid and followed the saga with some amusement and disbelief on Twitter, particularly during the painful episode when serious errors Wolff's (now-pulped) work Outrages came to light and her subsequent leap into the deep-end of right-wing conspiracy began. Klein takes the example of being repeatedly confused with Wolf and uses it to shine a light our current society, from social media pile-ons, to the dangers of letting algorithms do our thinking. She investigates our broken political systems and the feeling of disenfranchisement that allows people with very different views to form dangerous alliances for their own gain. It if a terrifying and eye-opening work that is thoughtfully presented and rigorously researched.

One of my favourite books of the year, and a hard one to describe as it’s like nothing I’ve read before!

WOW. One of the best books of the year, without a doubt. I also listened to the audiobook which was perfection. I have been recommending this to everyone.

Doppelganger is a strong contender for one of the best books I've read this year. Naomi Klein has long been recognized as a preeminent thinker. Another woman by a similar name and previously of an arguably similar background and political perspective has often been mistaken for Naomi Klein, to an entertaining and sometimes frightening extent. In Doppelganger, Naomi Klein inventively and fearlessly delves into the Other Side of the Internet - the far right as inhabited by fragile white women - as she follows where her doppelganger has gone and how people enter into this mindset.

Brilliantly constructed, researched, argued, thought out, Doppelganger is very much the deserving winner of the first Women's Prize for Nonfiction.

I love everything that Naomi Klein has written and this did not disappoint. What starts as an amusing story about mistaken identity turns into a fascinating analysis of the rise of the far right. Highly recommend.

This is such a hard book to review as it's unlike anything I've ever read before.
Doppelganger looks at how we deal with our identities and the current political climate. Klein mixes her own stories with smart insights, making complex ideas easy to understand. The book talks about how we handle different parts of ourselves in a divided world. Naomi Klein , Naomi Wolf, issues I hide away from, this book is recommended for people like me who have their head stuck in the sand

Thank you to Penguin Press UK and NetGalley for the complimentary copy of Doppelganger by Naomi Klein.

I'm sorry to say that I did not enjoy this book, and see by many reviews that I am in the minority.
I felt that this book was all over the place, and couldn't quite fathom how the author considered Naomi Wolf her doppelganger. Surely a doppelganger would be someone almost identical purporting to be the author. This is not the case. The doppelganger has vastly different views and interests to the author, which does not tie in well with the book title.

In addition, there seems to be so many aspects to this book and all within the same chapters too.

I managed to get halfway through this book and could not continue.

I am sorry, but this is not for me

An interesting read but quite difficult for get into as it was rather coldly written and i was expecting a larger exploration of the doppelgänger issue.

This was an interesting read exploring a world of conspiracy theories and one individuals place in this when they’re being mistaken for someone who embraces these concerns. It was full of lofty ideas and yet allowed for honest discourse about why individuals succumb to theories that some dismiss as irrational, whilst others are willing to give everything for them. Difficult to review but interesting to read.

Naomi Klein is often mistaken online for another Naomi. Only this Naomi has vastly different opinions to her. Naomi explores how society now moves through the world and interacts with the people who vocalise their opinions online (almost everyone, seemingly).

She explores how in this day and age, the line between who is right and who is loud is even harder to distinguish and how dangerous opinion-sharing can be, even to your doppelganger.

I wasn't sure what to expect with this. I thought there would be more emphasis on the doppelganger effect in general, but I feel more could've been done with this. That said, Klein delivers a wonderfully insightful and interesting book (more of a thesis, really). A recommended read.

I requested this book because I am one of those people that when in a bookshop suddenly can't remember if it's Naomi Klein or Naomi Wolf who I enjoy reading books by. I was fascinated by Klein's perspective on how the confusion has arisen and how it has affected her over time. I can see why it is a problem for her but there are sections of this book that seemed a stretch in how it connected to her central premise. Having sad that there were other sections that were so interesting and I was engrossed by. This was a mixed bag of a read for me but I am glad I read it and I would recommend it.

A fascinating book exploring the very real confusions that may arise on social media where two individuals have similar names - and the consequences this may have for individuals set in a well-written wider discussion of our digital society. Thanks to Netgalley for giving me the opportunity to read this ARC

Imagine you discover you have a doppelgänger, now imagine that person has controversial and radical views on the world which are being attributed to you online and no matter how much you sought to correct the narrative the algorithms proved more powerful, what would you do?

This was the situation Klein found herself in for the best part of a decade and this book is the result of her self confessed obsessive tumble into the mirror world of conspiracy theories and anti vaxxers where wellness influencers join hands with far right propagandists.

Klein’s book is in equal parts fascinating and terrifying. It seeks to explain the current state of the world and she contextualises this brilliantly by breaking down the theories and motivations by looking both into the future and the past.

It’s scope was outstanding from the rise of Trump as a political figure to autism as a precursor to the campaigns against Covid vaccinations, climate propaganda, 5G conspiracy theories, Hitler and fascism in context with colonialism and touches on the Israel / Palestine conflict, although it’s worth noting this was written before October 7th, to name just a few because I don’t believe I have the caption space to name them all.

Klein’s work is incredibly complex (admittedly I didn’t understand all of its parts) far reaching and utterly terrifying in its portrayal of the shadow world operating not particularly in the shadows anymore.

A worthy @womensprize non fiction shortlister it made me fear for the future but also a vital read for all. Strongly recommend.

I'm still not sure how Klein managed to pull this off but she did and it (mostly) worked. Some chapters lost their way a bit, but generally this is a great read for anyone who looks at the current political landscape and freezes with despair. I found the last chapter in particular extremely motivating and inspiring, which made up for some of my earlier confusion at how the threads of Klein's narrative created a whole.