Social Media Fiction Challenge (I did it, too!)

 I read a YA book for the social media fiction challenge. 

Should I award myself a badge?

I chose The Future of Us by Jay Asher and Carolyn Mackler [on Goodreads]

This book was about a teenage girl who had just received a computer .. and her friend next door, who brought over an AOL CD-ROM. Yup, it’s set in the early 1990s, and the main characters use dialup to log in to AOL. How does this relate to social media? Well, through AOL they find a secret portal to a ‘website” called Facebook that shows them the future. Like, 15 years into the future. And they are confused (is it a scam? A virus? Is someone pranking them?). Over the course of a week they check in on their future selves, gleaning details of their adult lives through posts, relationship status, friend lists, etc. And when they don’t like what they see, they start to realize that they can make small changes in the present that affect what they see of the future on Facebook. They know they shouldn’t, but they can’t help themselves. I’ll stop short of giving spoilers, and just say that it’s an interesting view of how we provide information on Facebook.

Great fiction it isn’t. But it’s an easy and charming read.