The debut novel from this Chinese Canadian author is an ok thriller that wades deep into the murky world of social influencers. The set-up is suitably daft. In the US are twin sisters. Julie works at the checkout in her local store, while Chloe lives in New York while maintaining her profile as one of the most successful social influencers around. The pair are estranged because when their mother and father were killed in a car crash, they were adopted by two very different sets of people in different parts of the country. Then, when Julie receives a mysteriously panicky call from Chloe one night, she ups sticks and heads to New York. She blags her way into Chloe’s apartment block and discovers her twin lying dead. As is the wont with such novels, she doesn’t report Chloe’s death – she reports Julie’s. The old switcheroo. Julie then finds herself living Chloe’s influencer life, which involves having her own PA, endless rounds of parties, and work-out sessions in swanky gyms. She also falls in with the ‘Belladonnas’, a crème de la crème group of influencers who exhibit various degrees of vacuousness. Zhang’s writing style is suitably breathless, if a little repetitive (people are “impossibly beautiful”, hands are “impossibly soft”) and credibility is stretched to near breaking point when the Belladonnas decamp to an island for some ‘Midsommer’ like madness. This includes a whole bunch of berserk stuff, which I wouldn’t mind so much (thrillers often take a turn for the ludicrous and remain gripping) if it was compelling, but I’m afraid I couldn’t quite hit the ‘like’ button on this one. RM

Published by Raven Books