IDENTITY CRISIS

Teenage girls play out a revenge drama online only to discover that there’s no hiding one’s true identity.

The two key characters, Annalise and Noelle, go to the same high school, but they aren’t friends. The shallow girls tell a shallow story through first-person chapter swaps. Noelle, at the behest of her grudge-bearing BFF, Eva, creates a bogus virtual romance to woo beautiful Annalise away from Noelle’s love interest. The guy bait, Declan, is a home-schooled relative of Eva who isn’t on social media and knows nothing of this charade. Disillusioned by guys who ogle her plus-sized boobs, Annalise is seduced by online conversations with Noelle/Declan, who seems ideal: clever, sensitive, and like-minded. Then Annalise decides to meet Declan in person, discovers the deceit, and proceeds to turn the tables on the vendetta. As plans go haywire, the teens begin to realize the darkness of their deeds, and both girls, stripped of anonymity, find their consciences. This tale seeks to authentically depict the current digital age while making a plea for finding depth and accountability in relationships. A story of revenge is often a crowd pleaser, and here this morality tale succeeds, but the intended audience will probably be too busy surfing the Web to read it.

For teens looking for love in all the wrong places, this social media fable is dramatized with love triangles, revenge, and rock-’n’-roll.