By Anna Lindwasser
In this particular verse novel, the protagonist is named Rosalie Solis. For much of her life, her parents have been recording her and using her to make a very popular “Family” Channel. The novel shows the pitfalls of being an influencer at a young age, whose parents have not put safeguards in place.
They have also recently started using her little sister for content, and as the novel progresses, it bothers Rosalie more and more that she is being exploited. She doesn’t want her little sister to go through what she did growing up in the camera’s spotlight.
The last straw for her is that a stalker approaches them while they’re on a walk, and she has to be creative to get away because her parents don’t have a bodyguard for her or her sister. It pushes her feelings of fear and dread to a breaking point, forcing her out of her cookie-cutter image and to declare her autonomy and independence once and for all.
For a fast reader, this novel can be finished in a sitting or two. Being that it’s shorter, it only goes so far into the dangers of early childhood exploitation. But it does a good job of portraying authentic feelings of being forced into the spotlight without protection already in place.
4/5 stars
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