All The Lonely People: BLOODY BRILLIANT with a bunch of great characters

“Everyone tells Kat that her online personality – confident, funny, opinionated – isn’t her true self. Kat knows otherwise. The internet is her only way to cope with a bad day, chat with friends who get all her references, make someone laugh. But when she becomes the target of an alt-right trolling campaign, she feels she has no option but to Escape, Delete, Disappear.
With her social media shut down, her website erased, her entire online identity void, Kat feels she has cut away her very core: without her virtual self, who is she?
She brought it on herself. Or so Wesley keeps telling himself as he dismantles Kat’s world. It’s different, seeing one of his victims in real life and not inside a computer screen – but he’s in too far to back out now.
As soon as Kat disappears from the online world, her physical body begins to fade and while everybody else forgets that she exists, Wesley realises he is the only one left who remembers her. Overcome by remorse for what he has done, Wesley resolves to stop her disappearing completely. It might just be the only way to save himself.”

All The Lonely People tells the story of Kat, a teenage girl who ends up being so horribly treated online by trolls that she deletes her entire online presence and ends up “disappearing” herself. It follows Kat’s journey from the initial trolling, through what happens when she deletes her last remnants online and the emotional toll it has on her and those around her.

Kat is treated HORRIBLY by a bunch of boys in school who have a very “anti-women” agenda. They push her so hard that she has already deleted a big chunk of her online presence at the beginning of the story (including her presence in a forum that she is particularly active in) and as the story starts, they are working to try and take over her website. Their plan is to rid the world of women who stand up for women. They’re horrible, horrible young men, influenced by their world which is filled with some HORRID toxic masculinity. I genuinely HATED them. Everything about what they believed and did made me SO CROSS. So cross that I had to send David a message saying “These young men are the worst”. Kat isn’t their first victim, nor is she their last victim. As the story progresses, you see that their next target is someone with a very big presence online. 

As well as brilliantly written Kat, we follow the story of Wes. Wes is, unfortunately, one of these young men who was guilty of trolling Kat to the highest extreme. However, Wes is a BRILLIANT exploration of conscience. He’s done these bad things BECAUSE he wants to fit in. He wants the cool kids to know he’s game for anything. He even goes on to prove this need further on in the book. But, he knows he’s made a mistake and wants to make amends. After making Kat disappear, he’s one of the only people who can sense she’s around and he wants to help her reappear. I really loved Wes. He’s a good kid underneath it all. He wants to be remembered. 

Massive shout out here to Wes’ big brother Jordan. I won’t say too much about Jordan, because spoilers, but he’s brilliant. I proper have a soft spot for him. Initially, not so much, but as the story progresses, you see he’s just looking out for his younger brother and will go to pretty extreme means to do that. 

Another of the characters who end up having quite an impact on the story is a young lady called Safa. Safa has “disappeared” and is set on making it final when we meet her in the story. Her and Kat end up becoming friends and we see their friendship develop as the book goes on. I wasn’t a big fan of Safa initially: she’s reckless and a bit of a dick. But if you give her a chance, she might change your mind. She helps Kat through this world of “the fade” and ultimately ends up being one of the most positive things Kat has in her life. 

(This review ended up turning into a review of characters and I am OK with that! I’m a BIG fan of brilliant characters!)

I think in the technological world we live in today, books like this are going to become more popular and I am HERE FOR IT. This book explored some topics that I think are necessary: toxic masculinity, online infamy and trolling. Something else that stood out for me was the exploration of the difference between our online selves and our “real life” selves – Kat disappears because her personality is all online and it ends up being deleted. It’s an interesting thing to think about: how different is online you to offline you? 

My goodreads review:

So much hatred for some of the males in this story. But so much love for Wes, Jordan, Evie and Kat. I think books like this, ones which deliver a message about being lovely in a world which is always on, are so needed. There’s some HORRIBLE shit that goes down in this story that is so true to online culture today. I just wanna hug Kat and be her friend.

If you’d like to read a Q&A I was lucky enough to do with the author, brilliantly funny David Owen, check it out here. Follow him on twitter @davidowenauthor.

Have you read All The Lonely People?
Can you recommend any books like this?
Do you think you’d like for your online persona to disappear altogether?

Let me know your thoughts in the comments! 

S x