Title: Don’t Read the Comments
Author: Eric Smith
Page Count: 368
Published: January 28th, 2020
Publisher: Inkyard Press
Genre: Teen
Received: From the Publisher in exchange for an honest review
Rating: 3/5
Summary:
Divya Sharma is a queen. Or she is when she’s playing Reclaim the Sun, the year’s hottest online game. Divya—better known as popular streaming gamer D1V—regularly leads her #AngstArmada on quests through the game’s vast and gorgeous virtual universe. But for Divya, this is more than just a game. Out in the real world, she’s trading her rising-star status for sponsorships to help her struggling single mom pay the rent.
Gaming is basically Aaron Jericho’s entire life. Much to his mother’s frustration, Aaron has zero interest in becoming a doctor like her, and spends his free time writing games for a local developer. At least he can escape into Reclaim the Sun—and with a trillion worlds to explore, disappearing should be easy. But to his surprise, he somehow ends up on the same remote planet as celebrity gamer D1V.
At home, Divya and Aaron grapple with their problems alone, but in the game, they have each other to face infinite new worlds…and the growing legion of trolls populating them. Soon the virtual harassment seeps into reality when a group called the Vox Populi begin launching real-world doxxing campaigns, threatening Aaron’s dreams and Divya’s actual life. The online trolls think they can drive her out of the game, but everything and everyone Divya cares about is on the line…
And she isn’t going down without a fight.
My Thoughts:
This was the first book that I have read by this author and it was a quick and fun read. I used to play a lot of video games, but then I got back into reading and haven’t changed since. Lol
I loved the message that is behind the book and the fact that it was about two gaming kids intrigued me.
Divya has her own streaming channel on Glitch and being a woman of colour there are some assholes that leave hate comments because she becomes the target of this online bullying group. Aaron and Divya meet by chance when they were gaming, they became instant friends an in doing so it may cost him his dreams of being a game developer.
Aaron is the complete opposite from Divya because she plays games so that she can get sponsorship to get money for rent and help her mom get her medical degree. Aaron on the other hand loves to develop games instead of being a doctor like his mom’s dream.
One of the things that I loved about this book was how the author was able to write such a compelling story about the gaming world that is starting to take the teens by storm and what its like when you get bullied online. I think that this is one of those books that they should give out in schools so that kids can read it and maybe learn something from it.
I received this book from the publisher HQN books in exchange for an honest review
Latteandbookz 