Presented mainly as personal and public webjournal entries and fanfiction, this book presents the story of BB, growing up with his two brothers, his mother, and the local 'gifted' children and teachers.

It's written really well, in that you don't actually know what is real and who is telling the truth = if in fact anything you are being told is real. The way it's constructed only adds to the confusion. Has anyone actually been killed? Who killed them, when and how? Are we reading the journal entries of someone with a strange set of fantasies, or chillingly cold killer flaunting his multiple kills? Who else is lying? ( )

I found it hard going with this one as none of the characters were likeable. Difficult to care about what happened to them especially through their blogs. It was better when they interacted in the real world but the point seemed to be that fiction and reality were dangerously overlapping as the subjects of the blogs died in reality the way they did in their fictional deaths. Synaesthesia was an interesting characteristic of blueeyedboy, the main protagonist, key to how he developed and interconnected with others... more interesting than the characters in fact. There were some interesting twists near the end but the conclusion was unsatisfactory as well. ( )

Lies and manipulation make a great story.
I really liked that the story was presented through blog entries and that the songs the character was listening to connected with the text.
Sometimes it's hard to know what is fiction and what is real but that was the point of the book. It shows the dangers online and offline.
I need to reread it someday because knowing the surprises near the end will change the experience. ( )

This thriller is filled with desire and mysteries, love and hate. The story is told through entries in a web journal, published by Albertine and blueyedboy, who shows us from the very beginning that they have a common past. She wants to forget about him, but he's determined to rekindle every flame of her dark secret. In this kind of cybernetic diary, with public publications, but also restricted ones, the reader is confronted with facts, or maybe just fiction, that marked and changed the lives of these two characters. However, it's difficult to distinguish truth from artistic freedom.

blueyedboy, or Benjamin, is a forty-year-old who lives with his mother, a manipulative and aggressive woman, in a small village called Malbry. There are two other siblings: Nigel, the black, and Brendan, the brown, as they have been cataloged to make domestic life easier. To escape from his own reality, Benjamin, the blue brother, takes refuge in the virtual world, throught the badguysrock community, showing us the dimension that a human being is capable of assuming when not conditioned by social rules. And if we are at first convinced that the main character is really a murderer (or an aspiring one) or that the story she tells us about Emily White and her fate is real, we quickly realize that we don't know who is who. And that, behind a screen, we can all be, say and do as we please. This is the revelation of the dark side of the internet, shrouded in crime, romance, dark humour and many psychological games.

Besides the very interesting premise, the characters have everything to captivate the reader's attention, especially Benjamin, who suffers from a neurological problem, synesthesia, leading him to associate smells and colors. Blue is the predominant color in this story, being associated with crime and unpleasant sensations, but music also has a prominent role in the narrative, through Emily White, who inevitably crosses the path of our blueyedboy.

As for Albertine, the young woman is much more than the red hood of modern times and the mysterious connection she maintains with the anti-hero reveals itself, little by little, throughout the narrative. However, the reader is mistaken if he thinks he will be finally understanding everything as soon as it reaches the end: the revolt is apotheotic and grinds the stomach, but it is deliciously surprising and, after a well-done digestion, it leaves a sweet aftertaste (at least for those who like challenges).

This is a much darker than is usual for Joanne Harries, but it is precisely this difference and also the topicality of the subject that distinguishes it. More than the narration of the life of a homicide enthusiast, it is also the portrayal of a society that builds masks to feel protected, that ceases to be who it is or that becomes who it wants to be or that finally reveals itself, but it still hides in subterfuge. ( )

https://tamaranth.blogspot.com/2022/06/2022087-blueeyedboy-joanne-harris.html ( )