Author: Patty Blount
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire, 336 Pages (August 6th, 2013)
From: the Publisher
Format: eARC
Add to: Goodreads
Order Online here: Amazon, Barnes and Noble, The Book Depository, Amazon UK
Synopsis: Best friends don’t lie.
Best friends don’t ditch you for a guy.
Best friends don’t post your deepest, darkest secrets online.
Bailey’s falling head-over-high-heels for Ryder West, a mysterious gamer she met online. A guy she’s never met in person. Her best friend, Meg, doesn’t trust smooth-talking Ryder. He’s just a picture-less profile.
When Bailey starts blowing Meg off to spend more virtual quality time with her new crush, Meg decides it’s time to prove Ryder’s a phony.
But one stupid little secret posted online turns into a friendship-destroying feud to answer the question:
Who is Ryder West?
Review: 3 Stars - TMI By author Patty Blount is a great example of a few of the dangers of the internet. While most people are smart in what they openly share with strangers far and wide across the World Wide Web it only takes a teen with issues, to get drawn into a dangers game. TMI explores some of the damaging effects and how they emotionally hurt those around them.
Told in alternating chapters between Bailey and Megan; best friends who are high school students and neighbors. They both know secrets about each other, have been there for each other during some hard times and know each other well enough to know when one needs space or the other needs time with her paintings.
Megan leads a structured life. She loves art and that’s pretty much the only way she expresses herself. She’s smart, knows what she wants and will do anything to get it. To me she was A LOT older than her true age. Bailey lives with her mother and grandparents. She is free, kind, smart and wants to find love and a good boyfriend. She’s more the free and easy going of the two. Megan wants nothing more than to take care of Bailey and make sure she doesn’t get hurt by anyone especially a boy.
The ups and downs of the relationship between these two all boil down to the fact that they are high school girls, who want boyfriends and who are polar opposites from each other. Where Bailey is somewhat flighty, Megan is strict. Enter in a boy that Bailey is crushing on via the internet and well, the two don’t exactly see eye to eye. Sadly the girls get petty as things get twisted and turned and words are the worst weapon these two use against each other.
Blount writes about real issues that anyone can find themselves in if they aren’t careful. Do any of us really know who we are talking to when typing from behind a computer? Its questions like this that will make readers ask and Blount tackles this subject by focusing on a couple of issues that everyone should think about when spending any amount of time online.
While the important message in the story is apparent and the characters interesting with a few somewhat shocking twists revealed, there were also moments in the beginning of the book that I wasn’t able to tell the two girls apart, which was a bit frustrating. Another thing that was somewhat irritating was how immature these two girls were, I had to keep reminding myself that they were in high school which was realistically how they would be. Being that realistic is a good thing, I just wasn’t expecting them to be so… I guess the word would be petty. When I remembered back to my high school years, Blount got these two girls and their personality’s pretty spot on and I have to commend her on that.
Once I got past the confusion as to which character was talking and telling her side of the story, it moved pretty quickly. I had an idea on who was behind things early on, but because I wasn’t sure and the story was keeping me interested it didn’t affect my enjoyment. I think that this is a great story for teens to read. Parents with children too because it would be a great conversation starter for something I believe should be talked about often. The internet can be fun and yet dangerous as well. Knowledge is important to every one of all ages and this story just might enlighten future readers. Enjoy.
Also check out my guest post and part 1 of this blog tour from author Patty Blount -
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