Book Review: "We Had to Remove This Post" by Hanna Bervoets

Again, this is another library find. I have to say that I love reserving books at the library because I don't have spend too much time there. It makes for easily finding books and not being bothered by overly zealous library volunteers. I know I should not complain about that but it does bother me. I want to be left alone for browsing time and if I need you, I will ask. But it seems that because I am the only person actually looking for books in the library and not just sitting there on the phone, or talking to friends - they flock to me and I try to be polite. But it's still annoying. However, this book was a reserve so let's take a look at it.

Our protagonist is someone who was someone who managed content on social media - flagging things that were offensive or harmful, removing content and making sure that things are not too bad on that level. She becomes traumatised by the things she sees and how she has to respond in a strangely detached way. It's written as a letter to a lawyer whom she has asked to leave her alone. I thought that though this was clever, I'm really struggling to find the 'clever' piece of a review of the novella. It is a reflection of our times, but it is not that 'clever'. It is alright, but that's about it. The writing is a bit empty and not that atmospheric. There's no real explanation for anything and it reads as a book more suited for the TikTok generation: short, quick and lacks the depth of other books of the same sub-genre.

The main character's name is Kayleigh and, after some work and making some friends - she gains access to a girlfriend named Sigrid. At the beginning everything is fine, but then Sigrid becomes kind of obsessed with the mindfulness and wellbeing community where she purchases multiple bags of goji berries and gets meditation applications whilst recommending teas to a fellow friend who thinks he is going crazy. It's at this time where Kayleigh realises things are changing. When a video is being watched for signs of violence, Sigrid cannot look as it reminds her of another person.

This person is a young girl whom Sigrid luckily remembered the name of even though, I find this to be nearly impossible given the circumstances of having to sift through hundreds of profiles a day. Kayleigh explains that Sigrid passed a video on to child protection in which a minor can be seen harming. This was well written even though the chances of remembering the name of the girl and being able to track her down on the internet without any backlash or reprimanding from your social media based job would be near-impossible.

As the book progresses, we do get snapshots and imagery of what life is now like for these traumatised people but it happens very suddenly and I feel the book is too short to properly take things in. As someone who likes to become immersed in the fiction I'm reading, I felt like we had really skipped over the entirety of the relationship between Kayleigh and Sigrid so quickly. It went from being very involved to Sigrid not speaking to her anymore in probably about half an hour of reading. This really upset the dynamics of the book for me and due to the sensitive topics involved in the book.

I'm not going to lie, there were some good point about this book too. For example: I actually felt like I knew Kayleigh for a while, before you know, she went a bit off the wall. There was also a time where I thought I knew Sigrid as well, but I did realise that we only found out about her through Kayleigh's eyes - this kind of sends the ending off the rails because then why would she then tell us about...well...I'll leave that out.

All in all, there were good points and bad points about this book but I do think that the book was way too short and terse for the story it was telling. However, if we take this out of the equation then what we have is a story which seems a little incomplete and rushed.