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4.18 AVERAGE
4.18 AVERAGE
This book is darker than I thought, it covers topics ranging from anxiety to having suicidal thoughts. It took some time for me to get into the story but otherwise, it is a great read. In some ways, I relate to Eliza, as a person struggling with social anxiety, the anxiety that gets to you when you have to talk to strangers, to make a phone call, to text to acquaintances. It did illustrate the anxiety better than I could have worded it myself.
I like a few of the things this story was trying to say, and a few small things it managed to accomplish, but I don't care for the great bulk of it.
First, the entire premise. I get that YA can depict teens in unrealistically aspirational situations, but as an adult reader I had trouble swallowing the idea that a teenage artist still in school was capable of producing such a beloved and beyond-wildly popular webcomic. It just felt fake to me the entire time, and since it's the entire core of the story, that's a problem.
Second, what is Eliza's deal? I mean that in good faith, because over the course of the story she shows various markers for a variety of mental illnesses or inherent neurodivergence, but the only aspect of her mental health that is actually addressed at any point is her post-revelation anxiety. Her obsession/hyperfixation on her art and the community it created could be read as a sign of autism, or ADHD, or depression-related escapism. Her absolute lack of interest in relating to other people on a face-to-face level could be any of those things or straight up social anxiety. At some points she clearly dissociates from her body, and that's never explored. And her final dip into briefly-possibly-suicidal territory happens in a flash for plot reasons and is never important again.
Nothing about her mental landscape is ever definitive, and by the end, treating her anxiety and calling that a day seemed shallow and slapdash. The inability (or unwillingness) of her family to recognize that she's not "normal" and take steps to either heal that (if it's treatable illness) or accommodate that (if it's neurodivergence) is a source of conflict that was genuinely painful to read, and not resolved to my satisfaction.
Third, Eliza's constant insistence that she's not a "writer," she's an artist. Okay, I get that you're not producing vast quantities of prose like Wallace's fan fiction or his novelization of your comic, but even if you're primarily using art, you're still "writing" a "story," Eliza. If you were just an artist, there would be no narrative, you'd just do endless portraits and landscapes of your fictional characters and world, and there would be no movement to it. Every time it came up, it felt so disingenuous.
Fourth, the romance, which was the thing I disliked the least. Even if I don't think it's great overall, it has the lion's share of individual good moments of the story. I liked that Wallace and Eliza became friends and eventually a couple by slowly accepting each other's weirdness. That's wonderful and I'm here for it whenever that's the basis for a relationship. I also love, truly and actually love, that when the split happens over Eliza's withheld identity, Wallace is allowed to be angry and stay that way for a good long while. So many romances rely on near-instantaneous forgiveness from the wronged party, and it often comes off as unbelievable that those characters get over their anger or betrayal so fast and with so little consequence. But here, Wallace is given the space to be rightfully (or perhaps even righteously) angry, he's allowed to express his hurt, and while our protagonist is clearly unhappy about that, she's not trying to pretend it's unjustified.
I'm less in love with how he does actually forgive her, because it's related to the book's ultimately shallow treatment of suicide. I think that really cheapens the ending of their arc, and also is another nail in the coffin of how this story poorly represents mental illness.
Finally, in the "things I didn't like" category, I don't feel that the story snippets included from the comic, or the comic pages themselves, added anything of noticeable value to the novel. I get what they're trying to do, but since I don't actually read this fictional web comic and I only have the vaguest idea of who these ancillary characters are from what the story characters say about them, I could never bring myself to care, nor could I easily see what were probably supposed to be parallels with the story characters. The book wanted me to be as deeply invested in this web comic as Eliza or her fans, but I can't be, because it doesn't actually exist for me to be invested in. I wanted to be invested in the story I was actually getting, and every time it dragged my attention away from that to the comic or the prose transcription of the comic, I didn't want that, I wanted more story.
First, the entire premise. I get that YA can depict teens in unrealistically aspirational situations, but as an adult reader I had trouble swallowing the idea that a teenage artist still in school was capable of producing such a beloved and beyond-wildly popular webcomic. It just felt fake to me the entire time, and since it's the entire core of the story, that's a problem.
Second, what is Eliza's deal? I mean that in good faith, because over the course of the story she shows various markers for a variety of mental illnesses or inherent neurodivergence, but the only aspect of her mental health that is actually addressed at any point is her post-revelation anxiety. Her obsession/hyperfixation on her art and the community it created could be read as a sign of autism, or ADHD, or depression-related escapism. Her absolute lack of interest in relating to other people on a face-to-face level could be any of those things or straight up social anxiety. At some points she clearly dissociates from her body, and that's never explored. And her final dip into briefly-possibly-suicidal territory happens in a flash for plot reasons and is never important again.
Nothing about her mental landscape is ever definitive, and by the end, treating her anxiety and calling that a day seemed shallow and slapdash. The inability (or unwillingness) of her family to recognize that she's not "normal" and take steps to either heal that (if it's treatable illness) or accommodate that (if it's neurodivergence) is a source of conflict that was genuinely painful to read, and not resolved to my satisfaction.
Third, Eliza's constant insistence that she's not a "writer," she's an artist. Okay, I get that you're not producing vast quantities of prose like Wallace's fan fiction or his novelization of your comic, but even if you're primarily using art, you're still "writing" a "story," Eliza. If you were just an artist, there would be no narrative, you'd just do endless portraits and landscapes of your fictional characters and world, and there would be no movement to it. Every time it came up, it felt so disingenuous.
Fourth, the romance, which was the thing I disliked the least. Even if I don't think it's great overall, it has the lion's share of individual good moments of the story. I liked that Wallace and Eliza became friends and eventually a couple by slowly accepting each other's weirdness. That's wonderful and I'm here for it whenever that's the basis for a relationship. I also love, truly and actually love, that when the split happens over Eliza's withheld identity, Wallace is allowed to be angry and stay that way for a good long while. So many romances rely on near-instantaneous forgiveness from the wronged party, and it often comes off as unbelievable that those characters get over their anger or betrayal so fast and with so little consequence. But here, Wallace is given the space to be rightfully (or perhaps even righteously) angry, he's allowed to express his hurt, and while our protagonist is clearly unhappy about that, she's not trying to pretend it's unjustified.
I'm less in love with how he does actually forgive her, because it's related to the book's ultimately shallow treatment of suicide. I think that really cheapens the ending of their arc, and also is another nail in the coffin of how this story poorly represents mental illness.
Finally, in the "things I didn't like" category, I don't feel that the story snippets included from the comic, or the comic pages themselves, added anything of noticeable value to the novel. I get what they're trying to do, but since I don't actually read this fictional web comic and I only have the vaguest idea of who these ancillary characters are from what the story characters say about them, I could never bring myself to care, nor could I easily see what were probably supposed to be parallels with the story characters. The book wanted me to be as deeply invested in this web comic as Eliza or her fans, but I can't be, because it doesn't actually exist for me to be invested in. I wanted to be invested in the story I was actually getting, and every time it dragged my attention away from that to the comic or the prose transcription of the comic, I didn't want that, I wanted more story.
Before I state my opinion, I’ll say that this book was a huge Owlcrate fan favorite. A lot of subscribers enjoyed this book and I completely and totally understand why. It’s a great book, short, sweet, and probably very easy for many introverted people to relate to. So my low-ish rating is more of personal opinion and not necessarily an indicator that this is a bad book.
I think this book is easy for a lot of readers and introverts to relate to and that ability to relate is what makes it so enjoyable. For me, I am kind of different because, while I do enjoy escape into books, I am not the kind of introvert who doesn’t enjoy real life, even when I don’t fit in. I feel like becoming comfortable in my own skin is important to me, even as tempting as escaping into myself tends to be, and it’s always kind of made it difficult for me to relate to the types of introverts who prefer to escape. This book is for those people. For me, it just wasn’t a book I identified with, though the author did create characters I wanted to root for even if I couldn’t relate.
On another note, I also dislike and do not participate in fan-fiction, so there’s another thing that other people probably loved and could relate to that I just couldn’t. I will likely never pick up Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell (though I love her other books!) just because I know it’s not my cup of tea. I didn’t realize that this book would be about a fandom in that sense. Eliza created her world, but I didn’t expect the online fandom presence or the existence of a fan-fiction writer. And this definitely hindered my enjoyment of the book, though it didn’t really bother me until the end. I rooted for Eliza and Wallace for the majority of the book, but his behavior regarding his fan-fiction really bothered me and that’s partly because I think it was a crappy attitude about it but also because of how I feel about fan-fiction in general, published fan-fiction, and the rights of fan-fiction authors. (I’m sorry, but no author or artist or any person should ever be made to feel like they exist to give other people inspiration even if they do frequently inspire others. You are not an inspiration factory and if someone can’t get their life together it’s not your fault no matter what. This message WAS in the book, but the end of the book kind of rushed through some of that and I don’t think that was as clear as it could’ve been.)
And lastly, while I didn’t relate to Eliza, I felt like I understood her throughout much of the book. I was completely loving the book for at least 70% of it because the author did a great job of making me empathize with and love Eliza and “get” her situation. But once her identity was revealed and she had a panic attack, she generally stopped participating in life on and offline, and I just didn’t feel like the rest of the book handled the healing process very well. It glossed over a lot of it and I wanted the book to have more of a focus on overcoming and dealing with anxiety instead of just kind of skirting around it. While her family didn’t necessarily understand her focus on her comic and they finally understood it once they realized how big it was, the fact that it was so successful did not and should not mean that Eliza’s behavior was okay. There’s a middle ground there that just wasn’t obviously pointed out. I feel like the message, without meaning to, kind of sounded like “it’s okay to let anxiety control your life if you just do something successful.” The book did start to go in a more positive direction towards the end, but it just wasn’t as detailed or in depth as the whole rest of the book, so it just fell short for me and made the actual message it was trying to give a little less clear.
If you love comics, graphic novels, the creation of art, fan-fiction, and/or characters who are more comfortable online than in person and find that easy to relate to, this book is absolutely awesome and I definitely recommend it. But it’s not without flaws.
I think this book is easy for a lot of readers and introverts to relate to and that ability to relate is what makes it so enjoyable. For me, I am kind of different because, while I do enjoy escape into books, I am not the kind of introvert who doesn’t enjoy real life, even when I don’t fit in. I feel like becoming comfortable in my own skin is important to me, even as tempting as escaping into myself tends to be, and it’s always kind of made it difficult for me to relate to the types of introverts who prefer to escape. This book is for those people. For me, it just wasn’t a book I identified with, though the author did create characters I wanted to root for even if I couldn’t relate.
On another note, I also dislike and do not participate in fan-fiction, so there’s another thing that other people probably loved and could relate to that I just couldn’t. I will likely never pick up Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell (though I love her other books!) just because I know it’s not my cup of tea. I didn’t realize that this book would be about a fandom in that sense. Eliza created her world, but I didn’t expect the online fandom presence or the existence of a fan-fiction writer. And this definitely hindered my enjoyment of the book, though it didn’t really bother me until the end. I rooted for Eliza and Wallace for the majority of the book, but his behavior regarding his fan-fiction really bothered me and that’s partly because I think it was a crappy attitude about it but also because of how I feel about fan-fiction in general, published fan-fiction, and the rights of fan-fiction authors. (I’m sorry, but no author or artist or any person should ever be made to feel like they exist to give other people inspiration even if they do frequently inspire others. You are not an inspiration factory and if someone can’t get their life together it’s not your fault no matter what. This message WAS in the book, but the end of the book kind of rushed through some of that and I don’t think that was as clear as it could’ve been.)
And lastly, while I didn’t relate to Eliza, I felt like I understood her throughout much of the book. I was completely loving the book for at least 70% of it because the author did a great job of making me empathize with and love Eliza and “get” her situation. But once her identity was revealed and she had a panic attack, she generally stopped participating in life on and offline, and I just didn’t feel like the rest of the book handled the healing process very well. It glossed over a lot of it and I wanted the book to have more of a focus on overcoming and dealing with anxiety instead of just kind of skirting around it. While her family didn’t necessarily understand her focus on her comic and they finally understood it once they realized how big it was, the fact that it was so successful did not and should not mean that Eliza’s behavior was okay. There’s a middle ground there that just wasn’t obviously pointed out. I feel like the message, without meaning to, kind of sounded like “it’s okay to let anxiety control your life if you just do something successful.” The book did start to go in a more positive direction towards the end, but it just wasn’t as detailed or in depth as the whole rest of the book, so it just fell short for me and made the actual message it was trying to give a little less clear.
If you love comics, graphic novels, the creation of art, fan-fiction, and/or characters who are more comfortable online than in person and find that easy to relate to, this book is absolutely awesome and I definitely recommend it. But it’s not without flaws.
Un merveilleux récit qui reprend des thèmes assez vu (les amis virtuels, la célébrité sur internet, s'échapper de la réalité par l'art, grandir, trouver son avenir) tout en s'axant sur le mal être de personnages atypiques. Angoisse, anxiété, dépression, toutes ces thématiques lourdes sont reprises avec beaucoup de justesse et de profondeur.
Je suis passée un peu à côté de l'univers de "la Mer Infernal", l'oeuvre d'Eliza avec qui j'ai eu du mal à connecter parfois, ou même à faire le lien entre les messages et les thématiques. Mais ca n'enlève rien au fait que j'ai adoré ma lecture.
Je suis passée un peu à côté de l'univers de "la Mer Infernal", l'oeuvre d'Eliza avec qui j'ai eu du mal à connecter parfois, ou même à faire le lien entre les messages et les thématiques. Mais ca n'enlève rien au fait que j'ai adoré ma lecture.
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
I wanted to love this book. I really did.
It is not like i didn't enjoy it but reading this book was kind of frustrating at times.
But upon thinking about it, i decided that the frustration was simply part of the story.
The characters are frustrating on purpose. They are teenagers that feel misunderstood.
The book seems to be compared to "Fangirl" quite often, but don't let that fool you. Yes, they both deal with an shy and anti-social protagonist who create a story but that's about all the similarities those stories share.
It is not like i didn't enjoy it but reading this book was kind of frustrating at times.
But upon thinking about it, i decided that the frustration was simply part of the story.
The characters are frustrating on purpose. They are teenagers that feel misunderstood.
The book seems to be compared to "Fangirl" quite often, but don't let that fool you. Yes, they both deal with an shy and anti-social protagonist who create a story but that's about all the similarities those stories share.
Light 8/10
Short thoughts: It was an interesting story with both its fun and dark elements. I would recommend especially if you like fandoms, while having a good awareness of mental illness. It was slow at the beginning, but it got more gripping as the book went along.
Longer thoughts: The story relies heavily on two things: the fandom with Eliza's comic, and the anxiety that Eliza struggles with. The fandom portions were a lot of fun, though it does shows how fans can affect the creator of that art--in positive and negative ways-- and I appreciated how real it was. The brief showings of the comic, from Eliza's drawings to Wallace's fan fiction, enhanced the experience. Eliza's anxiety felt realistic, even when it got darker as she faced the pressures of working on her comic and how that impacted the relationships around her. The discussions that came from it were important and well done (it also discussed suicide, but that wasn't a main focus)
As for the characters, they had to grow on me. Eliza is not the most positive character, which I can understand with her circumstances, but I rooted for her as the story went on. I loved her online friends and how Wallace's friends made a place for her in their group. I sorta wished they were more a part of the story. I also wanted more of a family element. I can understand why Eliza was a bit isolated from her parents and brothers; however, they had some good moments at the end of the book, which could've happened sooner. Now for Wallace. I enjoyed his character for like 2/3 of the book. I enjoyed the relationship between him and Eliza; they had some sweet moments, while both characters had their own struggles that weren't glossed over. The last third of the book, however, made me question Wallace. He said some things to Eliza that made me dislike him at that point of the story. He did redeem himself by the end of the book so I couldn't hate him at the end. I can see people either being understanding or getting frustrated towards him.
Overall, it was a fascinating read and would recommend it if you're interested.
Short thoughts: It was an interesting story with both its fun and dark elements. I would recommend especially if you like fandoms, while having a good awareness of mental illness. It was slow at the beginning, but it got more gripping as the book went along.
Longer thoughts: The story relies heavily on two things: the fandom with Eliza's comic, and the anxiety that Eliza struggles with. The fandom portions were a lot of fun, though it does shows how fans can affect the creator of that art--in positive and negative ways-- and I appreciated how real it was. The brief showings of the comic, from Eliza's drawings to Wallace's fan fiction, enhanced the experience. Eliza's anxiety felt realistic, even when it got darker as she faced the pressures of working on her comic and how that impacted the relationships around her. The discussions that came from it were important and well done (it also discussed suicide, but that wasn't a main focus)
As for the characters, they had to grow on me. Eliza is not the most positive character, which I can understand with her circumstances, but I rooted for her as the story went on. I loved her online friends and how Wallace's friends made a place for her in their group. I sorta wished they were more a part of the story. I also wanted more of a family element. I can understand why Eliza was a bit isolated from her parents and brothers; however, they had some good moments at the end of the book, which could've happened sooner. Now for Wallace. I enjoyed his character for like 2/3 of the book. I enjoyed the relationship between him and Eliza; they had some sweet moments, while both characters had their own struggles that weren't glossed over. The last third of the book, however, made me question Wallace. He said some things to Eliza that made me dislike him at that point of the story. He did redeem himself by the end of the book so I couldn't hate him at the end. I can see people either being understanding or getting frustrated towards him.
Overall, it was a fascinating read and would recommend it if you're interested.
This is so so so GOOD! I never expect that I will be loving this.