Eternal Forever by Syl Waters #BlogTour

Jessie wanted to stay and fight and she'd hesitated. She could see herself now replaying the scene; she'd faltered, she'd looked around, she'd dithered before fleeing. And then once her legs had started, she'd run. Run and run. And she hadn't stopped. 

Eternal Forever by Syl Waters is a perfect example of a cozy mystery, where the murder is investigated by an amateur sleuth (or in this case, two amateurs).

This is very much a moral story of modern times which would appeal to the tech-savvy younger generation, who live their lives on social media and get too attached to the reality TV. 

Jessie, a former shop worker, is "hotter than hot hotcakes of the moment". She has a recording contract, hitting the number one slot in several countries around Europe with her single. "She had YouTube to thank for that - from nowhere to somewhere. Jessie's was the digital-era's Spinderella success story".

Her manager Tito believes that image is everything. He convinces her "to become a new Jessie, bury her past, change her image and switch up for the big time". As her manager, he is the one who makes her decisions and advises on what is best. "He was the gatekeeper, the go-between, the man who made things happen". 

Being Jessie's manager is just the start. He thinks the girl is set for super stardom.

"What they wanted her to be was the all-new Jessie Adams - the pop star. She was the dream girl, living the dream life, inspiring and aspirational".

Only Jessie feels a total fake. "She was the fakest fake there ever was and knowing what she'd become made Jessie feel afraid and a fraud. Inside she was empty, cold and disconnected. She hated herself. She'd sold out. And she knew it".

Now the awards ceremony is approaching, and the pressure is on both Jessie and her manager. The future looks promising, until the moment Tito is murdered, when they are staying in Spain.

In a moment of panic, Jessie flees the scene of murder, and doesn't inform the police what she has witnessed.  She is scared of the possible negative publicity, and turns for help to Mack Majors, who is a director and her account manager at Eternal Forever, the UK's first digital legacy management agency.

But Mack has his own problems: the company is one dysfunctional family, and there's an internal coup d'etat brewing at Eternal Forever. Duncan, one of the co-founders of the company and the genius behind the coding, is the main conspirator of the merging factionalism. It was Duncan's idea in the first place to create an agency, managing people's digital after-life.

"The idea of digital life after death had caught the market's imagination and flung them into the wave of speculative start-up fodder".

Fran, the second co-founder, is looking for potential investors.

"The business was running out of cash, and held a precarious position somewhere on the precipice of a very delicate fast melting speck of ice."

On top of that, one of their clients, a beauty vlogger with a big following, is found dead. Maggie is a victim of online abuse, who's too vulnerable to fight against the trolls and who believes the whole world is turned against her.

Rather than deal with Jessie's conundrum himself, Mack sends his assistant J-Pop to Spain to try to discover who killed Tito and why.

J-Pop is a wannabe reality TV star. He has no previous experience and knows nothing about detective work, but he understands the importance of the PR scene and is tempted by the opportunity to spend time with Jessie. Thus a detective team is born -  Jessie and J-Pop begin digging deep to find out who did it.

Eternal Forever is an entertaining read, with the chilly undertones of the power of social media tech support providers and the hostility of the anonymous mob, howling for your blood. The waves of hatred towards anyone who's got a celeb status online is sadly all too true to life. The vicious type of intolerance on social media is staggeringly frightening. Any views which these keyboard warriors don't agree with are condemned, the people are threatened with rape and murder. 

The wannabe-Influencers like Katherine Williams (one of the secondary characters in the book), are dreaming of a superstar success, and envy her vlogger peers who've managed to become famous. Her own attempts to gain traction on social media had failed miserably. All she is capable of is venomous hate.

The toxic world of Influencers and online abuse are portrayed with an illuminating insight. This is not just the problem of the younger generation, it is pretty universal and could affect any of us. The cyberbullies should be prosecuted for the crime of hatred, but in real world they are left unaccountable.

I found it hard to relate or even like any of the characters, all their dreams of success at any cost and making it big are too vacuous and self-centred.

Take the poor deluded Maggie, the beauty vlogger of some talent, who killed herself as she couldn't cope with the toxic hate. What a tragic waste of young life, and what for? Was the fame of her beauty channel and the fickle love of her fans who quickly turned against her, worth it?! 

Acutely observed, this cozy mystery explores many topics and realities of modern day.

Purchase Links

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B08D6RNR18

Author Bio –
Most people know crazy cat ladies are a ‘thing’, but I’m a proud crazy guinea pig lady! I love fun in the sun and plenty of cocktails. My happy place is flip flops. I write stories to keep me company - my characters ensure I’m never lonely and always smiling (when I’m not tearing my hair out!)
Social Media Links – 
www.sylwaters.com
Twitter: @waters_syl 
Insta: @mrbob.guineapig  
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/syl.waters.54 

This post is part of the blog tour for Eternal Forever.

Many thanks to Syl Waters, Eleftheria and Rachels' Random Resources for my copy of the book!