posted on 20 Feb 2016

Web of Darkness by Bali Rai

This is, first and foremost, a high-octane thriller that moves at a hell of a pace and doesn’t hold-out on tension, thrills and fear. However, I suspect quite a lot of the commentary on the book will focus on the very topical issue of on-line bullying, grooming and paedophiles – emotive issues that Rai puts right at the beating heart of the story. It would be a shame if the reputation of this book rested on it being about ‘issues’ rather than for the skilful and compelling storytelling that refuses to patronise and treats its teenage target audience as if they were adult readers.

The nature of the story – its mysteries, twists and turns and white knuckle tension – prevents me from talking too much about how the plot unfolds for fear of spoiling the surprises and helter-skelter action. What I can tell you is that the story is recounted primarily through the eyes of Year 11 school student, Lilly Basra – an intelligent young woman with body image issues – who is on the build-up to her GCSE examinations. Her best friend Tilly is her constant companion and a staunch champion of decency and fairness who is something of a loose cannon when it comes to confronting the school bullies and their hangers-on.

Like many young people of their age they are concerned about their friendships and romances and play much of this out on their smart phones and on Facebook. But the otherwise normal world of Lilly and her friends is thrown into chaos when their technology is invaded by malign influences determined to exploit the young people and inject evil Into the teenagers’ febrile world.

The source of this evil comes from two anonymous adults known only as The Spider and The OTHER. It becomes immediately clear the character known as The OTHER is a paedophile who is operating a web-based distribution of child pornography but who plans to turn his fantasies into something more real. He is being controlled and manipulated by The Spider – a character who is an extraordinarily disturbing creation who simply enjoys destroying people’s lives and will do anything to stay under the radar.

Bali Rai is far too good a writer to provide simple or unrealistically optimistic outcomes. He shows us that what happens online can’t always be confined to the digital world – too many people are now so invested in the technology and have committed so much emotional capital in their networks that the real world and the virtual world can no longer be kept separate. The lives of Lilly, Tilly, Kane and all the other teenagers are as complex as they’ve ever been for young people on the verge of adulthood but they also have to deal with the added complications of being in a permanent state of connection where fear of rejection or exclusion is always with them.

The book could leave you feeling pretty gloomy about what faces our younger generation if it wasn’t for one key element that shines out like a beacon – the central importance of love in their lives. For all that Lilly goes through she retains the ability to fall in love and even when she is in her most distressing situations she finds that love can still make her happy. It seems to me that this is the author’s central message – however harsh and inhuman the world can feel and how unpleasant individuals can be, love is always there to provide hope for the future.

It’s quite a daring decision for a male author to choose the persona of a teenage girl to tell his story through and in less skilled hands it could have gone horribly wrong. But it didn’t - the novel has just won the Southern Schools Book Award which is, I think, voted for by the pupils themselves and it’s hard to imagine a greater accolade for a writer and a superb confirmation that the book itself has relevance for its audience.

 

Terry Potter

February 2016