On 3rd January 2022 Sam(antha) Miller, best selling author and owner of Shakti, a lifestyle brand, is about to launch her 4th book ‘Chaste’. She has her audience (young, mostly white and female) in the palm of her hand, this is the power of the cult idol with over 3 million social media followers. This is Sam at her peak, literally moments after her speech to her “loves“ the world she has created with all its power and monetary benefits begins to implode. Well, I dare say if you plonk yourself at the top of a brand success pedestal at some point you’ll fall off. Is she a good person? Authentic? Truthful? Only time will tell. O’Neill, B., Gallego Pérez, J. I., & Zeller, F. (2013). New Perspectives on Audience activity: ‘Prosumption’ and Media Activism as Audience Practices. In K. C. S. Niko Carpentier, & L. Hallett (Eds.), Audience Transformations: Shifting Audience Positions in Late Modernity (pp. 157-171). Routledge Ultimately, to me, this does a huge disservice to everyone who has ever been the victim of sexual violence. Our MC has suffered through sexual violence, but since she lied about how it happened, it will only be used against her. The best friend, who has come forward with her allegations and is obviously not well, literally only suffers for trying to speak her truth and will continue to do so now that the truth is finally out in the world. So really, there is no way to win. Isn't that just the uplifting message you want to send to people dealing with sexual violence? Obviously it isn't. So why send it? People claimed they wanted the the truth but when faced with it, it was too messy for them to accept. The truth often felt like a story, one with plot holes, an unreliable narrator." On the one hand, the book is an exploration of the nature of memory and truth. How well do we really remember the past? Most people today have heard the phrase "my truth". The question is: is this something to be sneered at? Surely there isn't "my truth" and "your truth" but only "THE truth", right? But what if there isn't? What if the "truth" is dependent upon your point of view? What if someone else has a very different view of an experience you had? It's a chilling thought.

We are all capable of being incredibly moral and incredibly monstrous, given the right circumstances. It does us no service to try and hide from our shadow selves."I've lived in this city long enough to know that the only thing these people can't forgive is poverty. If you have enough money, they'll forget everything." In this paper, regardless of the label of the idol, the concept of idol specialization in East Asia is the main stepstone to exploring how idols and fans complement each other and develop together in the Internet era. The analysis contains analyzing the interaction between idols and fans, the development pattern of fan groups, and the dramatically toxic fan culture. In addition, the influence of fan culture on society cannot be ignored. The study also analyzes the impact of this fan culture on real society and provides reference implications for how we can deal with this phenomenon. The article also concludes with suggestions to correct this phenomenon of drastic and toxic fan culture, seeking to make fan culture develop in a positive and healthy direction, avoiding possible risks and providing some impetus to the development of society and healthy development of business. Cohen, J. (2001). Defining Identification: A Theoretical Look at the Identification of Audiences with Media Characters. Mass Communication & Society, 4, 245-264. A gripping read from start to finish. People are going to be talking about this book for a long time to come! Thank you to NetGalley and to Random House UK for the ARC in exchange for my honest review. Idol will be out on May 12th - guaranteed to be a hit!

Liu, X. (2020). Observation on the Turn of Music Talent TV Show 3.0 in China. Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Art Studies: Science, Experience, Education (ICASSEE 2020) (pp. 535-540). Atlantis Press. So why did I struggle with this book? Well, for starters, I truly could not stand Samantha. She is perhaps one of the most horrible characters that I have come across. Although I accept that not all protagonists are perfect - they are, in fact, better when they have some flaws and complexities to their personality - with Samantha I was repulsed by her. She is a narcissist, and perhaps one of the most toxic people that has been portrayed within a book that I have read. And we also see in Idol the truth of the adage that if you tell a lie enough times, you start to believe it yourself.

The Effect is a book intended to introduce students (and non-students) to the concepts of research design and causality in the context of observational data. The book is written in an intuitive and approachable way and doesn’t overload on technical detail. Why teach regression and research design at the same time when they are fundamentally different things? First learn why you want to structure a design in a certain way, and what it is you want to do to the data, and then afterwards learn the technical details of how to run the appropriate model. Overall though this book really tries to be woke to instead fall into all the harmful tropes and ultimately not say anything important. You can't give a man the power to make you cry. That's what they want and if you're weak enough to give it to them, they won't respect you. There's always one person who loves the other a little more in a relationship." I love how this novel explores the many versions of truth as well as trauma and memory. It starts uncomfortable but important conversations about consent, sexual assault and the #MeToo movement. It's also an acute deep dive into the influencer lifestyle and image, social media toxicity, performative wokeness and cancel culture.

Miller is absolutely obsessed with her past and her relationship with her best friend Lisa and ex-boyfriend. It's intriguing but equally terrifying to see a grown woman completely infatuated with past events to the point where she is willing to risk everything to try to return to that time. Everyone else has managed to move on but not Samantha. She has everything she could ever want- money, fame, a huge following of young women who are obsessed with her every word- but she can't let go of the past. Miller's life is a car crash in slow motion- the reader will be gripped to see what happens next. I couldn't help but think of the movie Single White Female when I read about Miller's actions!A strange book to review and although am giving it lower marks they are good lower marks if makes sense, an unsettlingly unable to pigeon hole book that would recommend you read if you want to shake up your mind a bit! Bainbridge, J., & Norris, C. (2012). Madman Entertainment: A Case Study in ‘by Fans for Fans’ Media Distribution. Media International Australia Incorporating Culture & Policy, 142, 5-15. This author is just a master at creating these amazingly complex, flawed human beings and you hate them but relate to them all at the same time for the perfectly imperfect way they swan through life. I think so much can be written about the world of influencers - particularly a type of influencer (rich, white women) who don't really know the meaning of struggle taking advantage of the needs and issues of other women who are so desperate for a calm face to guide them through it all. There were some great moments in this when we see how Sam's following is mostly white young women (but that's not her fault) and she receives criticism from BIPOC influencers in the same sphere for her cultural appropriation when it comes to the type of practices she preaches which seem to be a mixture of different faiths and organisations. Maybe that was what she was selling; the impossible promise of safety. Maybe that was all these women wanted, in the end."