Member Reviews

I started reading this book with enthusiasm.

However, the constant past and present view points made this book a little hard to follow. But the biggest issue for me was the tone of the narrator in the present. The writing was silly and slow moving, compared to the writing for the past.

At one point, I didn't care anymore what actually happened after reading and reading and reading about the clothes in the storage locker and how her sister wore it better.

This book felt almost comical at times and it really ruined the story for me.

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*Book Review*
Social Misconduct
by S. J. Maher
Thanks to @netgalley @simonandschuster for an arc .
*I have a love hate relationship with this book. I read about a third, didn't like it and put it down. Two weeks later I felt like I should try it again. I'm so glad I did! It's slow going at first with a lot of whining and bitterness from Candace. Stick with it. It gets better. It's told in present tense, running, and past tense, the backstory of how this happened. When Candace really starts to run, the pace picks up. She's running from a murder charge and a social media smear campaign orchestrated by an unknown enemy. Candace asserts her innocence repeatedly. She's lost everything. I won't spoil anything, but she gets involved with some bad people by accident, and very bad shocking things happen. What?! At this point, I got a sense of dread about where this was going. The narrative sort of starts to turn in a direction that I didn't want to believe. She uses everything and everyone she can to help her escape. The story has a very unexpected twist that left me speechless! I didn't see it because it was buried so well. There is a menacing creepy vibe in the latter third of the story, which is justified. I just didn't imagine it would end like that. Candace is intelligent, intuitive and witty. She's good at many things that I won't mention here. This is a relevant story about the dangers of social media. Hackers can ruin your life. Sad, but true. People can't be trusted at all. .
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I received an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I had high expectations for this thriller. The subject is of topicality (social medias, Internet voyeurism). It is well written, but I had to stop reading at 40% because the story wasn't going anywhere. Probably not my type of book.

Thank you Simon and Schuster Canada for this ARC.

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Social Misconduct
S..J. Mather

Description
A timely and shocking thriller about a young woman who is the target of a social-media smear campaign.

Her perfect job becomes the perfect nightmare when a stalker hacks her phone.

Candace Walker is thrilled when she lands a great new job at a hip Manhattan tech company and gets a brand-new iPhone. She’s more than ready to move on from creating clickbait ads for weight-loss pills and herbal erection boosters, and is determined to dazzle the startup launch team she joins.

A week later, though, everything is at risk: Candace is the target of a mysterious harasser and an internet smear campaign. She tosses her new phone into the bottom of the Hudson River, begins hiding out in her sister’s storage locker in New Jersey, and can’t think of a single person she can trust. But Candace hasn’t come this far—and gone to such lengths—to submit to what is happening to her without a fight.

A terrifyingly immersive cautionary tale about social media and the internet, unlike anything you’ve ever read before.

Thanks to NetGalley for the advance copy for my honest review.
Sorry to say, there was just too much very sexual content that does NOT add to the book, but is just creepy. Very graphic and the Internet voyeurism thing seemed too over the top. I did not care much for the too much info and not enough real story.

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Thank you to #NetGalley and #SimonandSchuster for this ARC

#SocialMisconduct is a spine-chilling narrative of social media voyeurism. When a young woman becomes the target of an online hacker, her world is turned upside down as she ends up in a terrifying fight for her life. The plot is fast paced and supported well with a dark, gritty underpinning and a constant edginess. However, some of the subject matter could be a trigger for certain readers and the novel would be better categorized in the horror genre based on that alone. The book was well written and was unique in theory. 4 stars.

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Candace Walker is thrilled when she lands a great new job at a hip Manhattan tech company and gets a brand-new iPhone. She’s more than ready to move on from creating clickbait ads for weight-loss pills and herbal erection boosters, and is determined to dazzle the startup launch team she joins.

A week later, though, everything is at risk: Candace is the target of a mysterious harasser and an internet smear campaign. She tosses her new phone into the bottom of the Hudson River, begins hiding out in her sister’s storage locker in New Jersey, and can’t think of a single person she can trust. But Candace hasn’t come this far—and gone to such lengths—to submit to what is happening to her without a fight.

This was definitely a modern, creepy thriller! It really makes you think twice about social media and the internet. Well written and the characters are believable. A great book, but did have some difficult topics so it might not be a story for everyone.

Thank you #NetGalley for the ARC of Social Misconduct by S. J. Maher
Pub Date: 30 Apr 2019

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I like the premise of the book. However, there should definitely be a "trigger warning" about suicide ideation. I am not a fan of books with that in it.

I will not be posting a review on Amazon or Goodreads because I didn't read the whole book.

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I received an advanced readers copy in exchange for an honest review.

This one is creepy and vaguely misogynist - A woman is exploited and then tortured it just feels kind of porny and distracts from the actual mystery. I understand the book is supposed to be a takedown of Internet voyeurism but it actually seems to serve those tendencies more than critique

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