Sara Shepard

Lilia Buckingham

After her family moves to Los Angeles, Delilah Rollins, already a minor Internet celebrity, plunges into the competitive and glamorous world of social media influencers, but can cosmetics and good lighting conceal cheating, manipulation, blackmail, and murder?

Influence

Leticia Leal

Thank you to Net Galley and Delacorte Press for the ARC!

Influence is a book by mega author Sara Shepard and 16 year old real influencer, Lilia Buckingham. This book is similar to Shepard's other works in that it is told through multiple perspectives. There is Delilah an up and coming influencer that just moved to LA, Fiona Jacobs an influencer that suffers from OCD, Jasmine Walters-Diaz, a child star desperate to break free, and Scarlet Leigh, the influencer with the perfect life, that may not be so perfect behind the scenes.

The book follows Delilah as she befriends the other influencers, attends events, and quickly becomes embroiled in drama. Being that it is a Shepard book, of course someone ends up dead and we don't know whodunit. This was a quick read and the glimpse into the rigors of being an influencer was interesting. It is important for teens to see that social media fame isn't always as beautiful as it looks.

Caitlyn DeRouin

tw: murder, bullying, mentions of ed

rtc

Sarah Vorobets

Loved the aspect of the book! Did not really like how things went in the end.. I also didn't prefer the multiple POVs but that's just my opinion

meanwhile it was entertaining to read and the plot seemed interesting, the writing style just didn’t do it for me. when it was starting heating up nicely, it was over just like that, not leaving much time for it to develop.

If you loved We Were Liars, be the first to read this twisty new mystery that dives into the world of teen influencers from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Pretty Little Liars Sara Shepard and seventeen-year-old actress and social media personality Lilia Buckingham. After a video she makes goes viral, everyone knows Delilah Rollins. And now that she's in LA, Delilah's standing on the edge of something incredible. Everything is going to change. She has no idea how much. Jasmine Walters-Diaz grew up in the spotlight. A child star turned media darling, the posts of her in her classic Lulu C. rainbow skirt practically break the Internet. But if the world knew who Jasmine really was, her perfect life? Canceled. Fiona Jacobs is so funny--the kind of girl for whom a crowd parts--no wonder she's always smiling! But on the inside? The girl's a hot mess. And when someone comes out of the shadows with a secret from her past, it's one that won't just embarrass Fiona: it will ruin her. Who wouldn't want to be Scarlet Leigh? Just look at her Instagram. Scarlet isn't just styled to perfection: she is perfection. Scarlet has a gorgeous, famous boyfriend named Jack and there's a whole fanbase about their ship. To everyone watching online, their lives seem perfect . . . but are they really? The sun is hot in California . . . and someone's going to get burned.

Makayla Reed

This was a crazy ride of a book. I did enjoy it, but at times it felt long and a little bit boring. There seems to be a lot of setting up, which I guess it is necessary since this book is all about influencers. I think you need to be able to see the hierarchy of the influencers before you delve deep into the murder mystery of it all.

I do have to say that I really hated Fiona as a character, there are a few side characters that are quite annoying too, like Chase but for the most part the characters are interesting and I really enjoyed their perspectives.

Lastly, I felt like the big reveal made absolutely no sense. I thought I knew who it was and that person made so much sense, yet the actual killer came from way out of left field. The scene of the big reveal really sealed the bizarreness of the whole thing. Although, this is the same thing that happened in Pretty Little Liars so I am not sure why I am so surprised that the killer didn't make much sense.

Megan Leprich

*Thanks to Delacorte Press and NetGalley for the complimentary copy for my honest review*

I was expecting a lot from this book since Sara Shepard is one of my favorite authors but this fell pretty flat for me. I was bored for a majority of the book and just never really got invested into the story. I think I've come to the conclusion that I don't care for books about famous people, it's not the fact that I can't relate to them (obviously) but I just honestly don't care about them. It got good towards the ending but then left me in total confusion so I feel my 2 star review is justified in that sense.

Influence

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