Denn wenn sie einen Mann küsst, dann bezeichnet sie sich offensichtlich ja nur als bi, um Aufmerksamkeit zu bekommen, oder? The themes it tackled best were related to the fakeness of social media but in 2022 don't we all already know that?

Eartha finds fame online on Wonder Land, a social media app where users can create an online persona that represents their dream self, but she soon realises that being a viral sensation isn't as glamorous and exciting as it first seems.The distance between her online and offline self grows further and further apart until something dark happens that leads her into total self-destruction, forcing Eartha to make a choice; which version of herself should she kill off?

She aims "to bring women together and give them a permission slip to define feminism on their own terms. what is even more unfortunate is that people actually don't think this reads like a wattpad fanfiction with too many jarring in-text author's notes interrupting the actual narrative, except these 'author's notes' take the form of eartha's inner monologue, considering she is a very obvious self-insert of florence given herself. This author has tried to do something pretty wonderful; use their voice to promote feminism, queerness, bisexuality and show us that social media is detrimental to our health and well-being… and that the world is still controlled by men. Man muss in einer bestimmten Stimmung sein, um dieses Buch zu mögen, ich hatte aber das Glück, dieses Buch in genau dem richtigen Moment gefunden zu haben. You also get an insight into the author’s love of allegories — even a drink coaster gets a simile (‘like a rocket’s discarded engine’) So here’s mine: this book is like an overripe peach.We openly talk about sex we have, we openly talk about masturbation, and we’re very honest about our feelings with one another. As a novel about queerness, it is stuck in clichés as well: The story is full of lesbians who hate men and think that their personal freedom is rooted in the fact that they don't have sex with them. It’s completely out of proportion and in reality, if anyone posted a sloppy drunken video being like “I hate men, I think I’m gay”, it would just be scrolled past. i can tell that florence given really thought that she was a genius for touching upon three issues bisexual women face at one when, in reality, she only turned them into a joke by exaggerating this scene to no end.

We get text massages and audio messages (which I liked, because Given incorporates digital communication in a realistic manner), and we also get parts (imagined by Eartha) written as a script that underlines the staged life as a social media persona.

But despite this seeming disavowal of the idea of being a Gen Z Voice, Given is clearly passionate about the lives of women and giving shape to their experiences; where the book breaks down is both in the limits of its perspective and in its frenzied desire to pack in every topic of discussion. but then my mum came into my room and said some homophobic shit that made me cry (thank you for the reality check! which is why it's frustrating to me that people are responding to this like "the characters were all queerphobic stereotypes (except eartha, obvs; it wasn't hard to flesh her out since she is actually a real person), however interesting exploration of how men are a plague on this earth but bisexuals with boyfriends are valid, 3*" because what exactly were you expecting? As a queer woman in a relationship with a man, the commentary surrounding bi-erasure in the queer community within the book was both affirming and heartbreaking to read about. Das bedeutet dann aber nicht unbedingt, dass das vorherige Label falsch oder nur ein Übergangslabel war, sondern nur, dass dieses Label in dem Lebensabschnitt, in dem sich diese Person befindet, grade nicht mehr passt.

Both the tagline – “a hot, dark story” – and the blurb’s hook – “a feminist reimagining of Jekyll and Hyde” – are inaccurate, though the sudden, repetitive use of “it seems like there are two sides to you” in the last 50 pages seems designed to hastily half-justify the pre-agreed Jekyll idea.it also feels very much like /someone/ was about to miss their deadline, hence the hilariously abrupt ending of 'wonderland existed 2018-2030,' which feels very, 'and it was all a dream. I’ve followed Florence Given’s account on my personal Instagram for quite a few years now and, to me, the first part of this novel felt almost like a fictionalized autobiography of her trajectory to fame on Instagram.