Girl Online Review

Now I'm writing this on my Notes app on my phone listening to The Vamps on repeat (and being able to make out who sings which part) in the car as I have had no internet connection all day as I've been out. But I wanted to get ahead of my blog posts. So I apologise in advance for and errors/mistakes and the wrong use of apostrophes (I never know where to put them) as I will then copy and paste this straight into Blogger!

I'm going to be reviewing Girl Online by Zoe Sugg if you can't tell by the title!! I received this book for Christmas like every other teenage girl in the country. I didn't read it as quickly as some as it takes me a while to get into books however I did really begin to love the storyline. This book is about a 15 year old girl, Penny, from Brighton and is based around her blog. She records what she gets up to on her Christmas holidays on her blog under the alias 'Girl Online' hence the book being called Girl Online. The blog later causes trouble for her. 

I won't go into too much detail incase some of you haven't read it, but basically Penny is embarrassed greatly at school. Then suddenly her mum and dad have plans to whisk her off to New York for Christmas as a job opportunity has come up. She is reluctant to go as she has recently be suffering from panic attacks and was scared to go on the plane. With help of her mum, dad and best friend Elliott, she jets off to New York. When in New York, she meets 'Brooklyn Boy' and they instantly hit it off. She believes him to be her soul mate and he believes she is his 'Inciting Incident'. But Noah has a secret and when Penny leaves New York to go home, many stories start popping up and her fairy tale Christmas starts turning into a nightmare. Everything changes suddenly for Penny - and it's for the worse. Noah's secret could possibly ruin his relationship with Penny and wreck the strong friendship that herself and Elliott have built up. (Read on for my opinions and views of the book you may not want to read some parts as there may be spoilers. These will be marked with two stars: ** )

You can really see aspects of Zoe's personality and the things she enjoys through this book. This includes the part where Penny says on her blog 'when you post something online you have a choice' this is a quote that Zoe used in her blog about hate on the internet. Also, the fact that Penny watches Friends and her brother and dad were sitting on the L-shaped sofa also relates the book to Zoe's life. 

If i read this book before getting interested in blogging and watching YouTube and vloggers, I'd think that the sort of stuff that happens in this book can never happen in reality. But after Zoe stopped daily vlogging due to hate and everyone started #WeLoveYouZoe on Twitter, it becomes apparent that hate like what Penny receives is real and when all of Penny's readers start #WeWantGirlOnline it is weird knowing that people feel the need an want to do this due to repulsive behaviour. 

   **I think that for me, the ending is possibly a bit rushed as Noah appears and then the book ends. I would've quite liked Elliot to meet Noah or Megan and Ollie to see Noah and Penny toegther. However I am not putting the book down in any way and I don't want you to think that as I found the book enjoyable. This for me has been one of those books that i would read again and again yet not get bored of. There's not many books that do that with me. I kind of almost miss the book. I know that may sound extremely corny but you get so into the characters and the storyline that when the book ends you just wonder what you're going to do next. I know that Zoe received so much hate over this book but I'm sure the newspapers didn't actually read the book. If they did, they'd see that there is actually a lot of good advice in the book for those who suffer from panic attacks. I also liked this book because it was written in a way that just seems normal and that you can relate to. Not in a way that is so pompous you just don't want to read in any more. It addresses many problems, no matter how petty they are, that happen to people such as embarrassment at school, people being two-faced and, as John Green/Augustus Waters would say, 'falling in love the way you fall asleep, slowly and then all at once'. 

     I find though that the book is in some places a bit too twee and slightly corny. My brother (who is 19) picked up the book and started reading bits of it out loud. When he read it and in the voice he read it in, it seemed so corny but then I read that bit and it seemed good. So I think, and it's the same with every book, the greatness of a book depends on the reader. But as he said, it was basically written and could easily be written by someone in Year 8, however it has to be so that it can appeal to a large audience and gain a large profit which, I'm happy to say, made the book the quickest selling since Harry Potter!! Wow!! Also, I don't want to be one of those fangirls who says that the book is perfect because, to put it bluntly, it isn't. Everything and everyone has flaws so I'm not going to sit here and go on and on about how it had nothing bad about it although the book is extremely relatable and in no way am I trying to offend Zoe with my review as I think it is a fantastic book. 

Sorry about the really long post I just had a lot to say!!

Do you agree with me or do you think the complete opposite? I'd love to see your ideas as the book has many different views in the comments!

I will be doing Top 5 Books of 2014 but two books that I think at the moment could be in it are on the way from Amazon and with it being New Years Eve tomorrow I don't know when they will arrive (I want to read them before I do my Top 5 post). So stay tuned!

Emily xx