Title: Want To Go Private?Author: Sarah Darer Littman
Publication Date: August 1, 2011 (Scholastic Press)
Format: Ebook - 384pgs
Rating: ★★★
Goodreads Page
Summary: Abby and Luke chat online. They've never met. But they are going to. Soon.
Abby is starting high school--it should be exciting, so why doesn't she care? Everyone tells her to "make an effort," but why can't she just be herself? Abby quickly feels like she's losing a grip on her once-happy life. The only thing she cares about anymore is talking to Luke, a guy she met online, who understands. It feels dangerous and yet good to chat with Luke--he is her secret, and she's his. Then Luke asks her to meet him, and she does. But Luke isn't who he says he is. When Abby goes missing, everyone is left to put together the pieces. If they don't, they'll never see Abby again.
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Abby is a 14-year-old who has just started high school. Luke is an almost 30-year-old man who Abby met in an online virtual world for teens. If you're thinking, "These two couldn't possibly have any reason to be communicating." then you would be absolutely right.
This was actually my second time reading this book. The first time I read it I was only about 14 and I'd borrowed it from a friend per their recommendation and it's a book I've thought about a lot since. I happened to notice it in the YA section of my library on the OverDrive app and decided to reread it as I could hardly remember any of the plot. What I could remember was that I had really liked it and that I felt at the time that it was different from anything else I had read before. It had a very serious subject matter and I thought, at the time, that it had been handled well.
This book is beyond infuriating and it's so cringey, but not because it's written poorly, quite the opposite, in fact, it's because it's written so well. The subject matter (teen girl being preyed on by pervy older man on internet) is handled so well and so accurately IMO. The subtle and sometimes not-so-subtle ways in which 'Luke' extracts information from Abby about her life and relationships with friends and family is exactly how predators go about doing it. He uses her own insecurities and negative feelings to isolate her from everyone around her. And because this is coming at a time where Abby's life is changing and she's feeling her worst, she is especially vulnerable to him.
I have to be honest here, while I was reading the first half of this book I was so annoyed. Every little bad decision that Abby makes was just infuriating because I felt that if she really stopped to think about what she was doing, she would realize she was making horrible choices and fix them. Abby herself mentions several times that she's taken internet safety classes and knows she shouldn't talk to strangers or give them personal information, but then she shrugs it off and does it anyway. However, as the novel continues, you start to see the intrinsic ways in which Luke has manipulated her into genuinely believing that he has her best interest at heart. You realize how easy it was for Abby to fall into his trap and it isn't because she's unintelligent, it's because she's at an age where she's especially vulnerable to this form of manipulation. This idea of academic v. emotional intelligence is discussed briefly towards the end of the novel while Abby is talking with a therapist.
One of my favorite aspects of this book is the ending and how positively it wraps up. This isn't a novel about internet safety that exists purely for entertainment purposes, it has an inspiring message too. Abby not only returns home safely, but it realistically depicts the aftermath of what's happened to her. She struggles with returning to her family life, she experiences PTSD, she has a hard time coming to terms with the fact that 'Luke' lied about everything and that she did not really know him. Abby has to face a negative backlash from other kids at her school and tries to reconnect with her friends. She ends up going to therapy (which I think sends a great message about getting help when/if you need it) and she decides to start doing talks at schools about her experience, which may not be something that everyone would find helpful, but it does help Abby.
I only really had a couple issues with this book and one comes when people who knew 'Luke' are mentioned reacting to the news of what he's done. His mother says something along the lines of "I wonder if this has anything to do with that business between him and the priest back when he was an altar boy." Hearing this, Abby's sister remarks that it's typical for people who were abused as children to grow up to be abusers as well. I know this may not seem like such a big deal because it is true that it's common for abuse victims to become abusers but in the book, it's only mentioned to state that it's typical with no other discussion had. There's no mention that it's not always the case or that there are other factors that go into becoming a predator, and it just bothered me that it almost made it seem like if you've been abused then you will become an abuser.
Another issue I had comes when Abby's sister see's the picture of 'Luke' that the police show the family. Abby's sister notes that 'Luke' looks like a normal guy, not the creepy old man you imagine when you hear about pedophiles and perverts. Again, this is something that's mentioned once and generates no more talk after. I think it would have been nice to see the characters talking about how he looked so normal and someone mentioning that the average predator does look like everyone else and specifically, I would have liked for it to have been mentioned that women are predators too. 'Luke' isn't considered to look like the stereotypical predator because he's not too old, but other than that he fits the look of a stereotypical predator perfectly. He's described as a normal looking, middle-aged, white male. I think it would have been great to generate a little more talk on the different kinds of predators out there and how some get away with it for so long because they don't "look like a pervert", like female predators tend to.
Overall, I'm very pleased with how this novel covers every step of the process and I think it has a very positive outcome and message.
This was actually my second time reading this book. The first time I read it I was only about 14 and I'd borrowed it from a friend per their recommendation and it's a book I've thought about a lot since. I happened to notice it in the YA section of my library on the OverDrive app and decided to reread it as I could hardly remember any of the plot. What I could remember was that I had really liked it and that I felt at the time that it was different from anything else I had read before. It had a very serious subject matter and I thought, at the time, that it had been handled well.
This book is beyond infuriating and it's so cringey, but not because it's written poorly, quite the opposite, in fact, it's because it's written so well. The subject matter (teen girl being preyed on by pervy older man on internet) is handled so well and so accurately IMO. The subtle and sometimes not-so-subtle ways in which 'Luke' extracts information from Abby about her life and relationships with friends and family is exactly how predators go about doing it. He uses her own insecurities and negative feelings to isolate her from everyone around her. And because this is coming at a time where Abby's life is changing and she's feeling her worst, she is especially vulnerable to him.
I have to be honest here, while I was reading the first half of this book I was so annoyed. Every little bad decision that Abby makes was just infuriating because I felt that if she really stopped to think about what she was doing, she would realize she was making horrible choices and fix them. Abby herself mentions several times that she's taken internet safety classes and knows she shouldn't talk to strangers or give them personal information, but then she shrugs it off and does it anyway. However, as the novel continues, you start to see the intrinsic ways in which Luke has manipulated her into genuinely believing that he has her best interest at heart. You realize how easy it was for Abby to fall into his trap and it isn't because she's unintelligent, it's because she's at an age where she's especially vulnerable to this form of manipulation. This idea of academic v. emotional intelligence is discussed briefly towards the end of the novel while Abby is talking with a therapist.
One of my favorite aspects of this book is the ending and how positively it wraps up. This isn't a novel about internet safety that exists purely for entertainment purposes, it has an inspiring message too. Abby not only returns home safely, but it realistically depicts the aftermath of what's happened to her. She struggles with returning to her family life, she experiences PTSD, she has a hard time coming to terms with the fact that 'Luke' lied about everything and that she did not really know him. Abby has to face a negative backlash from other kids at her school and tries to reconnect with her friends. She ends up going to therapy (which I think sends a great message about getting help when/if you need it) and she decides to start doing talks at schools about her experience, which may not be something that everyone would find helpful, but it does help Abby.
I only really had a couple issues with this book and one comes when people who knew 'Luke' are mentioned reacting to the news of what he's done. His mother says something along the lines of "I wonder if this has anything to do with that business between him and the priest back when he was an altar boy." Hearing this, Abby's sister remarks that it's typical for people who were abused as children to grow up to be abusers as well. I know this may not seem like such a big deal because it is true that it's common for abuse victims to become abusers but in the book, it's only mentioned to state that it's typical with no other discussion had. There's no mention that it's not always the case or that there are other factors that go into becoming a predator, and it just bothered me that it almost made it seem like if you've been abused then you will become an abuser.
Another issue I had comes when Abby's sister see's the picture of 'Luke' that the police show the family. Abby's sister notes that 'Luke' looks like a normal guy, not the creepy old man you imagine when you hear about pedophiles and perverts. Again, this is something that's mentioned once and generates no more talk after. I think it would have been nice to see the characters talking about how he looked so normal and someone mentioning that the average predator does look like everyone else and specifically, I would have liked for it to have been mentioned that women are predators too. 'Luke' isn't considered to look like the stereotypical predator because he's not too old, but other than that he fits the look of a stereotypical predator perfectly. He's described as a normal looking, middle-aged, white male. I think it would have been great to generate a little more talk on the different kinds of predators out there and how some get away with it for so long because they don't "look like a pervert", like female predators tend to.
Overall, I'm very pleased with how this novel covers every step of the process and I think it has a very positive outcome and message.
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