coming of age in a tumblr & wattpad world

probably had some dire consequences

Fiction, 2023

The year was 2013, the time 6:15 a.m. Every morning before school, I would wake up with an all-consuming goal: to read the new chapter of Anna Todd's After on Wattpad. The thrills were high, and the writing was poor.

Fanfiction had a chokehold on my generation, and we're seeing its repercussions now (cough, The Idea of You). We're also witnessing a wave of literature that untangles these messy relationships between teens and idols (Idol Burning, Y/N, I'm A Fan). If you didn't immediately recognise the meaning of "Y/N", then this recommendation isn't for you, and you should probably check back next week. But for those of you who did, welcome to the pits.

Our unnamed narrator is working as a copywriter for an asparagus company in Berlin and has a boyfriend who's kind of an asshole. She's not really into the K-pop wave, but her friend pushes her to attend a concert. The crowds are crying, the lights are buzzing, and the scene is almost religious. It's in this spiritual haze that she sees Moon, one of the band members, and her new source of obsession. From the moment she sees him, her life reroutes according to the goal of Moon-proximity. Naturally, she jumps on the next plane to Seoul, starts a Tumblr account to write fiction about herself and Moon, and begins to stalk his every movement. 

This all sounds kind of insane and embarrassing, and it is, which is the point of fanfiction. But the story isn't silly; it's dense and dark (and often pretentious), existing in the depths of desire everyone feels but no one really talks about. If religious repentance, black coffee, and falling into internet research holes are your thing, then Y/N is too.

Song - My Love All Mine

Film - Perfect Blue

P.S. I dug into my archives for this one, and you can read a much clearer (and all-round better) review of this by yours truly at Asian Review of Books