In the fall of 2014, a seismic event crippled an entertainment giant and tantalized Hollywood gossip voyeurs everywhere. A group identifying itself as “Guardians of Peace” stole massive amounts of data from Sony Pictures Entertainment in a brazen cyberattack that was elevated all the way to the Oval Office. Thanks to carefully orchestrated leaks, phrases like “a minimally talented spoilt brat” (poor Angelina…) and “the masturbatory call is a wank I have no time for” were pulled from executives’ private emails and splashed all over newspapers and gossip sites. Careers were stymied, movie releases were cancelled, and a horrific new fear was born: What if the entire contents of your inbox could be read by strangers?
While the details revealed in our emails might not make international headlines, our inboxes can contain an entire blueprint for our lives. As a thriller writer, I can’t help but imagine what would happen if that blueprint fell into the wrong hands and this question became the basis for my suspense debut, Just One Look. The narrator is a young lawyer named Cassie who becomes infatuated with a seemingly perfect partner at the firm after stumbling upon private email exchanges between him and his wife while reviewing correspondence for a case. Cassie knows she shouldn’t read them, but she can’t help herself. What begins as a bit of snooping escalates into a dangerous obsession when Cassie devises a plan to take his wife’s place.
While working on this novel, purely in the name of research (please don’t arrest me for my search history!), I did a deep dive into how much information my protagonist could discover about a person using social media and a few strategic Google searches. A frightening amount, it turned out. All of it voluntarily divulged in the name of receiving another “like.” Social media can be a fun distraction, but it’s given us unnatural access into people’s lives, slowly eroding the concept of personal privacy. In today’s era of digital openness, you don’t need to be a professional hacker to uncover mountains of private data. All you need is an Instagram account and a mild curiosity.
But there’s a dark side to all this oversharing and a growing number of thrillers are exploring it, reminding us just how dangerous it can be to reveal too much about ourselves online. So, if your social accounts aren’t making you feel #blessed, here are five thrillers that might convince you to finally pull the trigger on that delete button.
You Love Me by Caroline Kepnes
Joe Goldberg made me question my online presence back when he was stalking Beck in the first installment of Caroline Kepnes’s brilliantly twisted You series, and now he might be the reason I officially swear off social media forever. In You Love Me, Joe uses Instagram to keep tabs not only on his son, but on the new object of his affection – responsible, grounded librarian Mary Kay. Joe’s determined to do things right this time and win her love the old-fashioned way…with meticulous online stalking, of course! But while Joe’s turning Mary Kay’s white hearts red, someone may be tracking his feed too. Careful Joe! With Kepnes’s trademark mixture of humor, horror, and pop culture savvy, you’ll tear through this page-turner (and then pare down your Instagram profile.)
Pretty Things by Janelle Brown
When I was half-way through reading Pretty Things, I double checked the privacy settings on all of my social accounts. That’s because it isn’t just stalkers who are trolling for information, it’s grifters too! Case in point, Nina. Nina is a con artist who preys on Los Angeles’s wealthy and careless, utilizing social media to locate and target her marks. When Nina’s mother gets hit with sky high medical bills, Nina and her charming boyfriend set their sights on their riskiest mark yet: Vanessa, an heiress turned influencer. But there’s far more to Vanessa than what appears on her feed, so buckle up for this dazzling game of cat and mouse.
People Like Her by Ellery Lloyd
I’m fascinated by the phenomenon of momfluencers, mostly because I would’ve liked to find a way to monetize motherhood too! Although, after reading this chilling thriller, I’m glad that ship has sailed. People Like Her is a clever exploration of the dark side of internet fame chased by Instamoms like Emmy Jackson (aka @the_mamabare), who’s built her identity, her livelihood, her very existence around broadcasting the unvarnished truth about modern motherhood to her millions of Instagram followers. But Emmy isn’t as honest as she wants her adoring fans to believe and one obsessive follower wants her to suffer for it. With three unreliable narrators, each as loose with the truth as a sponsored Instagram post, this suspenseful read will ratchet your anxiety level and might just kill any desire you have to become an influencer.
Confessions on the 7:45 by Lisa Unger
We all want to project our best selves in our posts, but after reading Confessions on the 7:45 I find myself wondering what’s lurking behind some of those shiny, happy photos after I’ve scrolled past. Selena Murphy presents a perfectly polished version of her life on Instagram, complete with a charismatic husband, two adorable children, the ideal nanny, and a dream job in Manhattan. Sound familiar? I bet we all follow someone like that on Instagram! But the reality behind Selena’s cheery photos is darker, uglier, and more dangerous than even she knows. With echoes of Patricia Highsmith’s classic Strangers on the Train, this thriller is chalk full of contemporary twists that will keep your head spinning. Trust me, you will never look at those carefully curated Instagram grids the same way again.
Followers by Megan Angelo
The dystopian bent in Followers feels like a natural turn to take for the social media thriller. We aren’t that far off from living out our lives online, right? This book imagines how far society’s obsession with instafame will go and I think the scenario seems frighteningly plausible. In this future, people wear devices that put the internet directly into their minds and government appointed celebrities live out their lives online 24/7. It is as terrifying as it sounds. But one reluctant celebrity, Marlow, is determined to flee the corporate sponsors who are willing to do anything to keep her onscreen. With millions of followers watching your every move, good luck with that Marlow! Maybe we should all heed the warning Megan Angelo is sending in this timely novel and think twice about chasing the dopamine hit of another “like.”
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