Eliza and Her Monsters by Francesca Zappia | Book Review

Title: Eliza and Her Monsters

Author: Francesca Zappia

Series: N/A

Genre: Contemporary, Romance, Young Adult

Publication Date: May 30th, 2017

Pages: 400

My ranting: 

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Her story is a phenomenon. Her life is a disaster.

In the real world, Eliza Mirk is shy, weird, and friendless. Online, she’s LadyConstellation, the anonymous creator of the wildly popular webcomic Monstrous Sea. Eliza can’t imagine enjoying the real world as much as she loves the online one, and she has no desire to try.

Then Wallace Warland, Monstrous Sea’s biggest fanfiction writer, transfers to her school. Wallace thinks Eliza is just another fan, and as he draws her out of her shell, she begins to wonder if a life offline might be worthwhile.

But when Eliza’s secret is accidentally shared with the world, everything she’s built—her story, her relationship with Wallace, and even her sanity—begins to fall apart.

“The computer is my rabit hole; the internet is my wonderland. I am only allowed to fall into it when it doesn’t matter if I get lost.”

HOLY GUACAMOLE! This book was so incredible it left me speechless! I freaking adored it. I’m a happy muffin right now. Like furiously happy. This story took me completely by surprise and made me fall in love with it bit by bit. It totally deserves all the hype it got.

This was on my most anticipated releases of 2017 and even though I tend to forget premises (because I really like to go and read a book knowing as less as possible), I had high hopes. I read back this year her other work, Made You Up, and really enjoyed it. But I have to say this outranked it by far. I connected so much with the characters, and felt the story so mesmerazing and overly beautiful. And also the art work of Monstrous Sea and the story itself was really amazing too (to the point where I wouldn’t mind if Zappia decides to write another books based on that!).

“I learned years ago that it’s okay to do this. To seek out small spaces for myself, to stop and imagine myself alone. People are too much sometimes.”

First of all, I have to say that lately I’ve been discovering a few books where the main characters are in fandoms, and being a reader myself and loving not only books but TV shows and movies… yeah, I find them so relatable. But there was something about this particular story that outstand the others (at least for now). Eliza was such an incredibly real and relatable character. I’ve understood her and agreed with everything she felt, for I’d been studying arts myself a few years ago and yeah, it’s true to create good content and being inovative while still keeping it in your line of work as well. I cannot tell you how much I’d struggled with those things. And throughout the book you could see everything she went through and battling with the fact that all of a sudden her identity has been revealed.

There’s also a great online friendship in the book! I loved how suportive they were and how accurate a long relationship was. Also the romance between both main characters was simply adorable. I don’t usually read many friends-to-lovers books, but I have to say when that trope is done well, it takes the book to a whole new level.

“And you getwhat I mean when I say I don’t want to spend my life doing something I hate. If you know what you’re meant to do, if you know what you love, why not do that?”

AND THE MAIN CHARACTER HAD AN INCREDIBLE FAMILY AND I WAS SO HAPPY. Despite the parents didn’t really understant her love for her comic, they try. They really did try to be suportive, even though it wasn’t the best way. And the two little brothers were two of my favourite characters. They loved her sister so much and you could see how their relationship with her changed the further you were in the story.

But overall, I love that despite being the fluffy, cute story that it is, it really deals with some very important mental health issues, which I didn’t know when I first started. It portraits both social anxiety and PTSD (not spoiler because I’m not telling anything more!). But since I myself suffer from anxiety I really liked to see it and the potencial triggers for the characters, and how the seek for help.

If you haven’t picked this book up yet, you totally should! You’re not going to be disappointed, honestly. It was amazing.

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