Britta Lundin

CLAIRE is a sixteen-year-old fangirl obsessed with the show Demon Heart. FOREST is an actor on Demon Heart who dreams of bigger roles. When the two meet at a local Comic-Con panel, it's a dream come true for Claire. Until the Q&A, that is, when Forest laughs off Claire's assertion that his character is gay. Claire is devastated. After all, every last word of her super-popular fanfic revolves around the romance between Forest's character and his male frenemy. She can't believe her hero turned out to be a closed-minded jerk. Forest is mostly confused that anyone would think his character is gay. Because he's not. Definitely not. Unfortunately for Demon Heart, when the video of the disastrous Q&A goes viral, the producers have a PR nightmare on their hands. In order to help bolster their image within the LGBTQ+ community-as well as with their fans-they hire Claire to join the cast for the rest of their publicity tour. What ensues is a series of colorful Comic-Con clashes between the fans and the show that lead Forest to question his assumptions about sexuality and help Claire come out of her shell. But how far will Claire go to make her ship canon? To what lengths will Forest go to stop her and protect his career? And will Claire ever get the guts to make a move on Tess, the very cute, extremely cool fanartist she keeps running into? Ship It is a funny, tender, and honest look at all the feels that come with being a fan.

Ship It

Sarah Sammis

We are to believe that the producers of the show are unprofessional enough to think up a contest at the last moment, rig said contest, and then invite a sixteen year old to be their official live blogger at the rest of the stops on the convention tour. We're then to believe that the adult stars of the show would be given access to said minor and she in turn would be given access to the official social media accounts.


http://pussreboots.com/blog/2018/comm...

Nico N.

Never thought I could hate a sapphic book but here we are.

CLAIRE is a sixteen-year-old fangirl obsessed with the show Demon Heart. FOREST is an actor on Demon Heart who dreams of bigger roles. When the two meet at a local Comic-Con panel, it's a dream come true for Claire. Until the Q&A, that is, when Forest laughs off Claire's assertion that his character is gay. Claire is devastated. After all, every last word of her super-popular fanfic revolves around the romance between Forest's character and his male frenemy. She can't believe her hero turned out to be a closed-minded jerk. Forest is mostly confused that anyone would think his character is gay. Because he's not. Definitely not. Unfortunately for Demon Heart, when the video of the disastrous Q&A goes viral, the producers have a PR nightmare on their hands. In order to help bolster their image within the LGBTQ+ community—as well as with their fans—they hire Claire to join the cast for the rest of their publicity tour. What ensues is a series of colorful Comic-Con clashes between the fans and the show that lead Forest to question his assumptions about sexuality and help Claire come out of her shell. But how far will Claire go to make her ship canon? To what lengths will Forest go to stop her and protect his career? And will Claire ever get the guts to make a move on Tess, the very cute, extremely cool fanartist she keeps running into? Ship It is a funny, tender, and honest look at all the feels that come with being a fan.

Maga P

I spent an entire day reading it and I'll concede that although there's something deep deep down in here about how fandom spaces can be of such help in the search of identity for lgbt folks… it gets trampled down in the entire mess that is the book in its entirety.

I'm not going through everything wrong with Ship It in detail though (fetishization of mlm disguised as fandom activism, discussion of rpf and incest fic as Casual Fandom Things, glorification of toxic fandom behavior, "pan lesbian", brushing off of fandom racism…) because then I'd be here All Day so just suffice to say:

This one should have stayed in wattpad, love ❤️

"Can I ship myself with this book?...I love this book so much I literally can't even." -Mackenzi Lee, New York Times bestselling author of A Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue Claire is a sixteen-year-old fangirl obsessed with the show Demon Heart. Forest is an actor on Demon Heart who dreams of bigger roles. When the two meet at a local Comic-Con panel, it's a dream come true for Claire. Until the Q&A, that is, when Forest laughs off Claire's assertion that his character is gay. Claire is devastated. After all, every last word of her super-popular fanfic revolves around the romance between Forest's character and his male frenemy. She can't believe her hero turned out to be a closed-minded jerk. Forest is mostly confused that anyone would think his character is gay. Because he's not. Definitely not. Unfortunately for Demon Heart, when the video of the disastrous Q&A goes viral, the producers have a PR nightmare on their hands. In order to help bolster their image within the LGBTQ+ community-as well as with their fans-they hire Claire to join the cast for the rest of their publicity tour. What ensues is a series of colorful Comic-Con clashes between the fans and the show that lead Forest to question his assumptions about sexuality and help Claire come out of her shell. But how far will Claire go to make her ship canon? To what lengths will Forest go to stop her and protect his career? And will Claire ever get the guts to make a move on Tess, the very cute, extremely cool fanartist she keeps running into?

Luc 

There was a lot I liked about this actually, and I liked it enough to finish it rather quickly. 
But.
the LGBTQIA+ rep was really, icky. Claire was clearly fetishizing them, and she also REALLY crossed a line in trying to get her ship to be canon. I cant believe we're supposed to like her.
Also her relationship w Tess was really fucked up.

Autumn

Spoilers are not hidden in this review. Opinions are my own.

There are only three people I can think of who would willingly read this book; sixteen year old fangirls, grown adults who unironically say, 'doggo', and masochists like myself who love to read bad books to review them.

We are introduced to the main character, Claire, who is writing fanfiction in her school's library. She loves a show called Demon Heart, and especially loves the non-canonical ship between the two male main characters, Heart and Smokey. Claire posts her fanfiction online and has a noticeable presence on Tumblr under the url heart-of-lightness. She is also sixteen, which we are not informed of once throughout the story. I only learned this from the book's summary. This makes her smut writing extra uncomfortable for the reader(s). If you’re like me and you were a cringy fangirl when you were a teen, you’re in for one hell of a ride.

Claire is not like other girls. She watches Netflix. She doesn't want to go to prom. She doesn't wear John Deere hats. Her parents are very quirky; her father is a poet, and her mother is an artist who displays nude self portraits around the house and makes pinterest recipes for dinner (teehee how weird!!!). The closest Claire has to a friend in her rural Idaho town is a Christian girl who eats on the school bus and reads the Bible at all times, because why wouldn't she? Surprisingly, she isn't the weirdest character we meet.

Meanwhile, Demon Heart isn't doing so well. We learn about Smokey's actor, Forest Reed, and how this show is his big break in his new acting career. Unfortunately, the ratings are down and the future of the show is in jeopardy. This isn't a surprise, seeing that the show doesn't sound like it has a unique premise (think Good Omens mixed with Supernatural). Just the way the show is described throughout the novel is confusing, and I still don't know when it's even supposed to take place. No wonder no one is watching it.

In a desperate attempt to keep their jobs, the team members on the show decide to advertise Demon Heart by attending panels across the country. For the sake of plot convenience, these conventions are every day of the week. At least that’s what I’m assuming, since there's no talk of weekend plans and Google maps says a car ride from Boise to Portland is less than ten hours. This is odd seeing that real conventions are typically Fridays-Sundays. Also, the only cast members who attend are Forest and Rico, the man who plays Heart. There's no way this show only has two beloved actors who fans would want to meet.

When Claire learns the cast of her favorite show is coming to-get this-BOISE, IDAHO of all places, she knows she has to go. The planned Q&A panel is her chance to interrogate the actors about their thoughts on the blatant fetishization of ship between their two characters, called SmokeHeart. She hesitates, but decides to stay in the crowd and not ask about the ship during the panel. This changes however when someone asks a question that is vaguely related to shipping and, unsatisfied with the answer that's given, Claire explodes and ends up asking the show's writer if they're going to become a 'thing'. She doesn't back down, and when Forest accidentally exposes his microphone while calling her crazy, the novel turns into a Wattpad-worthy, self-insert fanfic that can be placed in the same category as, 'My mom sold me to One Direction and now I'm on tour with them'. 

To make up for the publicity scandal that's brewing, the gang makes the awful decision to invite Claire on tour with them. This is the only way for them to make amends, because plot convenience. They do this by pretending to pull a random name out of a hat in front of a crowd of fans, when really her name is the only one inside. A totally legit contract the creators pulled out of their asses is given to Claire and her mother, and once it’s signed, they hop on the tour bus and skedaddle. 

Claire takes this as yet another fantastic opportunity to push her OTP onto the show's crew. She goes as far as stealing the show writer’s phone and hacking into his Twitter because he’s been avoiding this yaoi fujoshi like the plague. Our himbo Forest confides in her in an attempt to stay on friendly terms with her, and she turns around and writes fanfiction of him and his costar with the personal information she was trusted with (she even makes up something about him being beaten by his father). Not once does anyone openly regret bringing her along. Instead of coming across as a confident, feisty young woman, Claire is written as a recluse who doesn't understand social cues or other people's feelings. She's selfish, stubborn, and isn't corrected by her parents once throughout the novel.

A recurring topic that comes up in this book is Claire’s sexuality. She’s uncomfortable with labeling herself and hates that others seem to project ideas onto her about who she is attracted to. What’s funny is that she does this exact same thing to Forest and SmokeyHeart throughout the entire novel. Claire comes very, very close to realizing something, and much to the reader’s frustration, never makes the connection. There’s also this unspoken idea that wlw can’t fetishize gay men which is, for lack of a better word, yikes.

The novel is split into three narrators, that being Claire, Forest, and whatever fanfic we’re forced to read. Lundin doesn’t do a good job at giving all three perspectives their own narrative voices, and they sound more similar to each other than they should. Some chapters were literally one short paragraph, which is a waste of paper for multiple reasons. A majority of the novel felt like it was Lundin’s voice speaking instead of the characters’, which is especially true when Britta Claire randomly tells Forest to not use the word ‘crazy’ because it might offend mentally ill people. As a mentally ill person myself I could give less of a f/ck about something so trivial, especially when its shoehorned into a novel that’s already showing itself to be problematic. Britta Tess also takes pride in explaining sexuality and gender to Forest, and like the rest of the fake, corny dialogue in this story, I felt like I was sitting through a high school presentation instead of a fulfilling story.

Lundin is also very good at telling instead of showing. There’s something odd about her outright saying Tess is black. It probably has to do with Lundin making things like skin color and sexuality personality traits and not just parts of characters. As a white person, I can’t give the most accurate depiction of how this feels, but as a writer, I cringed at how up front she is about non white, non straight people being what they are with like, no hinting. It’s like it's getting shouted at you, and it adds to the idea that this book is just one big tumblr PSA. 

Speaking of tumblr, every time Claire and Tess interacted I felt like I was getting chewed out by someone on that site (I have a tumblr, I enjoy tumblr, I actively stay away from that side of tumblr). The two have literally just met and they’re already talking about how Tess has been affected by the lack of black characters on Demon Heart. There is nothing wrong with writing characters that act as spokespeople for representation, but that shouldn't be their only personality trait. Its obvious Lundin only included her in the story to be the poc character and not a poc character. There's also a time and place for these kind of conversations, but Lundin doesn't do a good job at incorporating it into the story in a way that feels natural. Does Tess like carrot cake? Does she have a dog? I wouldn’t know, because the only aspects to her flat character are her being a really good artist and wanting more representation in the media.

Claire is unable to wrap her head around the idea that people can hold multiple opinions at the same time. She thinks anyone who is against Smokey and Heart getting together in the show is homophobic, and she outs Tess to her non-fandom friends because what do you mean people can have multiple hobbies????

Every character is stripped down to their bare-boned stereotypes. The straight male characters are dressed as, and behave like they ask 15 year old girls for cigarettes and foot massages. Any girl who isn’t part of fandom culture wears chapstick and is stuck-up. We learn from Tess that nerds are truly the most oppressed people, as she has to keep her interests on the down-low with her friends and one of them even gets mad because Tess hid that aspect of herself from them. The only diversity comes from conventions and LGBT communities, which follow their own cringy stereotypes of what each is supposed to look like.

The romance between Claire and Tess is forced. Claire lacks friends and social skills. She manipulates the people around her, including Tess, who eventually becomes her girlfriend. Claire could have done much better with making friends instead of getting into a relationship. The forced wlw only adds to the irony that is, well, not every story needs canonical shipping. Claire, confused by her sexuality, also acts hot-cold towards Tess, showing affection for her one minute and ignoring her for another. The topic of intentional queerbaiting is brought up in regards to SmokeyHeart, but nothing is said about Tess’ obvious confusion to how Claire is seemingly attracted to her only half the time, which is like a real-life queerbaiting. Tess even mentions at one point that she thought Claire was straight because of how the other acted towards her. 

At multiple points in the novel, Claire claims her mission to make SmokeyHeart canon is not for her self-fulfillment of her perverted fantasies, but for all fans who need LGBT icons in the media. This is very ironic because it’s obvious this novel is Lundin’s own self-fulfillment, self-insert story. 

Britta Lundin could have used this book as an opportunity to explore toxic fandom culture. She could have made this a PSA about separating fiction from reality, showing that actors’ careers can be tarnished by rumors and gaslighting from fans who can’t separate the two. It’s obvious this book is meant for one specific audience, which is teenage fangirls who seek validation. I doubt she expected people to actually criticize her book. She doesn’t explain terms such as “WIP”, which can be confusing for those who are unfamiliar with fandom and/or writing. As someone who has never attended a panel, I still don’t know what a moderator does. 

At the end of the novel, the crew is buddy-buddy with Claire, for some reason. She's invited to moderate their panel at San Diego Comic Con because no one in this book learns any valuable lessons. A ten year old (yes, ten year old) asks Claire a question about fanfiction, and how she can write it with confidence since her friends mock her for it. She even addresses Claire by her tumblr url. Claire takes this moment to come out as queer instead of answering the question. If she were to actually answer it, I'm guessing her advice wouldn't be, "Do what makes you happy, but stay off the internet until you're at least 13/14. Also why are you ten and on my smutty tumblr blog?". Britta Lundin acknowledges that children are part of fandom culture, and not only does she not discourage Claire's actions throughout the novel, but she completely looks over the fact that children are being exposed to inappropriate media such as smutty fanfiction. Good stuff.

tldr; I see why Riverdale isn't praised for its writing.

Autumn 

I thought about finishing this book and then writing a review explaining why it's a terrible read but then I thought I could save myself my time and sanity and just reread a book that explains fandom better (aka Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell).
All I can say is, this book is all the creepy stuff everyone thinks fandom is and it's not even that well written.

Tânia Borges

** spoiler alert **
           2.5 stars.
Okay. First of all, the positive stuff.
I really liked the fact that the author included all the behind-the-scenes stuff on filming, writing, conventions, fandom, TV series, etc. I loved Forest as a character, and I enjoyed reading his development as a person throughout the book. Claire's relationship with her parents is nice and healthy, and the parents themselves are pretty funny and good characters. My favorite part was, without a doubt, the way the author described the fandom vibe and the connection between people that are (healthily) obsessed with the same books/characters/shows/movies, whatever. 
And... that's it.
I started reading this, thinking it would be a fun, light-hearted read. It wasn't. Mostly it just pissed me off. I hated Claire 95% of the time, and the other 5% she was just relatable (and not much). It was like someone took the worst, dark parts of being a sixteen-year-old fangirl and put them all together to make a character: Claire is downright obsessed, impulsive, self-centered, stalker(ish), rude and abusive - in the worst ways possible. I mean, she hacked into someone's Twitter account to blackmail him. Like, what even? And the fact that neither she or Tess, Claire's love interest, respect each other's opinions and boundaries? What kind of relationship is that? 
Also, the diversity and queer representation, which is meant to be something positive, is somehow... not. I get that the author (I hope!) had the best intentions in everything that it was written, but it just came through as too pushy and over-the-top to be taken seriously. I was hoping I would find a relatable, fanfiction writer, fangirl character and not some cringy wannabe. I'm sorry, but in my opinion this book was a mess and a disappointment, I was honestly cringing 99% of the time.

laura

*I got this book for review for the publisher for my honest thoughts*

I really enjoyed this novel so a lot. It def focused on LGBTQ characters but focused so much more on fandom and hollywood life and also normal struggles of teenagers. I grew to love these characters throughout this book. It was really quick read. It had some predictable moments but I loved how we also got to see fan fiction chapters as well as the duel POV. I thought the book was prefect summer read and got me super excited to attend my bookish conventions at the end of the month. I found it to be a really quick read and will def. check out more by this author in the future.

Jessica 

DNF @ 45% | Blog | Twitter | Instagram

All right, so, first things first: this wasn't for me and is absolutely an acquired taste. While I LOVE the author and can appreciate what she was aiming for with Ship It, the novel itself wasn't for me. I had some issues with it, and some connectivity struggles, and even though it wasn't a "bad" novel, it wasn't for me and I can't see myself finishing it anytime soon. 

That being said, I do think that this will be--or, is--a hit with a lot of readers. Despite any problems I had with it personally, I think that this is a good platform for its audience to feel heard or connected with and I am so happy that it exists for them. Because, it's a voice that was needed in YA fiction and it is great to see that represented. 

Taste is subjective and not everything is going to be for me, but that's okay! I think you should still give it a go, because my word is not the gospel.

Ship It

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