You Will Never Be Me by Jesse Q Sutanto – a Review
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Description:
Influencer Meredith Lee didn’t teach Aspen Palmer how to blossom on social media just to be ditched as soon as Aspen became big. So can anyone really blame Mer for doing a little stalking? Nothing serious, more like Stalking Lite. Then, Mer gets lucky; she finds one of Aspen’s kids’ iPads and swipes it. Now, she has access to everything: the family calendar and Aspen’s social media accounts. Would anyone else be able to resist tweaking things a little here and there, showing up in Aspen’s place for meetings with potential sponsors? Mer’s only taking back what she deserves—what should have been hers.
Meanwhile, Aspen doesn’t understand why her perfectly filtered life is falling apart. Sponsors are dropping her, fellow influencers are ghosting her, and even her own husband seems to find her repulsive. If she doesn’t find out who’s behind everything, she might just lose it all. What everyone seems to forget is that Aspen didn’t become one of TikTok’s biggest momfluencers by being naive. When Meredith suddenly goes missing, Aspen’s world is upended and mysterious threats begin to arrive—but she won’t let anything get in the way of her perfect life again.
Review:
You Will Never be Me by Jesse Q. Sutanto is standalone mystery thriller. We meet Meredith Lee, who is a successful Momfluencer, on both Instagram and Tik Tok. Meredith runs into an up-and-coming influencer, Aspen Palmer, and takes her under her wing, with both becoming BFF. Meredith taught Aspen to be an influencer, and how to increase her followers. Eight years later, Aspen has surpassed Meredith’s online popularity with millions of followers and Meridith is losing more each day. The ladies have a nasty fight, especially after Aspen cuts her off, ignores her and blocked her calls; and now they are enemies.
Meredith’s bitterness rises and as she begins stalking Aspen, secretly sabotaging her life; she changes appointments of Aspen, finding information about what is upcoming and slowly Aspen sees things are falling apart. Her sponsors have dropped her, influencers are ignoring her, and she sees both Meredith and later Liv, kissing her husband. Who is doing this to her?
About half way through the book, there is a twist, as Meredith goes missing, and Aspen’s world is upended and she puts herself live to show her worry about Meredith, as well as getting everyone to help find her; pleading to those who kidnapped Meredith and return her best friend. Followers go out of their way to help look for Meredith, and Aspen has reached out to millions.
Personally, I thought both Meredith and Aspen were not really likeable & mean, as they only cared about themselves. I knew this was a mystery, so I expected a whodunnit and even murder. Meredith’s sister was stuck taking care of Luca, and was desperate to find her. Aspen’s family, especially her husband Ben, were not happy with all that was going on. To say too much more, would be spoilers, and I do not want to ruin it for you.
You Will Never Be Me is a wild, crazy adventure that as we reach closer to the end, there were a number of twists and surprises. You Will Never Be Me was very well written by Jesse Q. Sutanto. Sutanto always writes different kinds of stories, with this book centering on friendships and obsession.
Reviewed by Barb
Copy provided by Publisher
