Review: Life in a Fishbowl by Len Vlahos
SYNOPSIS:
Fifteen-year-old Jackie Stone is a prisoner in her own house. Everything she says and does 24/7 is being taped and broadcast to every television in America. Why? Because her dad is dying of a brain tumor and he has auctioned his life on eBay to the highest bidder: a ruthless TV reality show executive at ATN.
Gone is her mom’s attention and cooking and parent-teacher conferences. Gone is her sister’s trust ever since she’s been dazzled by the cameras and new-found infamy. Gone is her privacy. Gone is the whole family’s dignity as ATN twists their words and makes a public mockery of their lives on Life and Death. But most of all, Jackie fears that one day very soon her father will just be . . . gone. Armed only with her ingenuity and the power of the internet, Jackie is determined to end the show and reclaim all of their lives, even in death.
REVIEW:
*Book Received in Exchange for Honest Opinion/Review*
I keep trying to think of an elegant way to say this but this book was f*cked up. Like honestly, what the heck did I just read?!I am going to try to dissect where this story went wrong for me. The synopsis and cover had me intrigued, which is why I picked up the book but as you read, the book is an actual void of emotion. There is not a moment on the page where you are able to resonate with any members of the family processing grief. There is no emotional connect to any of the characters, from the point of diagnosis till death, no character really drives home the pain and loss of a loved one.
The story is told in third person, with multiple POVs, from the the father, to Jackie, to her vapid sister, to her lost mother, to the brain tumor that is consuming the father’s brain one memory at a time, everyone gets a say. But this is too much because there were also numerous other POVs and while the author does succeed in tying everything together, he fails to hook the reader in the story. For a while, the story felt like the author took a past pre-med degree and was like “Let me show you all the terminology I know about the brain,” which really took away from the actual story. In addition, everything happens in a whirl-wind, where Jared was at one moment diagnosed with cancer and the next the TV crew is here….
The crew was filled with awful characters, the worst being Ethan (the executive at ATN). Then there is a nun who appears, who isn’t very holy or saintly and honestly a hot mess ensued. Around page 200, I put the book aside temporarily because it was just sad. There are no tender moments in Jared’s last weeks alive. It was literally just watching the family wage war against ATN and trying to survive. It was just depressing, and honestly the sadness left a bitter taste in my mouth. As I close the book I still feel the sadness lingering, which is not something I want when finishing a book.
The author does wrap things up nicely, providing a detailed wrap-up of all the characters but I still feel distraught. Maybe because the story initially started out being about Jared’s cancer but really morphed into how a reality show consumes and ruins people’s lives. I feel like the underlining story and message got lost in the chaos of multiple POVs and unnecessary side characters. I’m not really sure, all I know is that as I sit here reflecting on this book, as a reader, I am not satisfied.
LINKS:
Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes and Noble
