In the real world, Eliza Mirk is shy, weird, and friendless. Online, she’s LadyConstellation, the anonymous creator of the wildly popular webcomic Monstrous Sea. Eliza can’t imagine enjoying the real world as much as she loves the online one, and she has no desire to try.
Then Wallace Warland, Monstrous Sea’s biggest fanfiction writer, transfers to her school. Wallace thinks Eliza is just another fan, and as he draws her out of her shell, she begins to wonder if a life offline might be worthwhile.
But when Eliza’s secret is accidentally shared with the world, everything she’s built—her story, her relationship with Wallace, and even her sanity—begins to fall apart.
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Okay, I’m not going to lie, this book was really good.
All the characters act like normal people, even Wallace, Eliza’s love-interest-guy, who is awesome, by the way.
All the drama with Eliza’s parents and siblings is just normal family drama, which is kind of nice. Her parents, although clueless about modern internet trends and usage, are loving and only care about the happiness of their kids. Eliza’s brothers, who are twins, are slightly annoying at the start, but become more and more loveable as the book goes on, and as both you and Eliza learn more about them.
The book normalizes online relationships, particularly friendships, and it makes fanfiction, fanart, webcomics, and fandoms in general less of a cringy teen thing to participate in and more of an expression of creativity that anyone can do. Posting creatively on the internet is something to be proud of, and something positive, instead of something guaranteed to ruin lives.
It discusses the internet’s power of anonymity on the internet in a positive way. Eliza is a shy, awkward, slightly odd girl, and so she feels most confident when she can express herself fully on a place where no one knows what she looks like or what she did in the past. She can be herself, without all of the judging and the stigmas against her and what she loves to do.
I liked the ending and the tie-in with the author of a series Eliza loved, who had abandoned her book for the same reason Eliza was afraid to finish hers. I also loved Eliza’s battle with writers’ block, artist anxieties, the loss of creative motivation, and the fear of never being good enough. It was really inspiring, and made me want to write, which is something I haven’t felt in a long time.
If you’re a teenager on the internet, especially if you’re one who writes, or draws, or just celebrates the works of others, you would love this book.
Review originally posted on http://www.thecheyisalie.com/
