New Book Alert: Netted: The Beginning by K.T. Rose; Engaging Mesmerizing Thriller Journey Into The Dark Web By Julie Sara Porter

 

New Book Alert: Netted: The Beginning by K.T. Rose; Engaging Mesmerizing Thriller Journey Into The Dark Web

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

Spoilers: The Dark Web is an area of the Internet in which many have heard but not as many experienced. It is the darker areas on the Internet that remains unexplored and mostly unadministered. One of its most infamous aspects are the amount of illegal activities that occur there. Illegal drugs and weapons can be purchased and humans can be trafficked. Stalkers can follow victims without being traced. People can watch Livestream videos of mutilations, rape, cannibalism, and abuse. It's a frightening place where many of the darkest fetishes and fantasies are revealed.

That is the milieu of K.T. Rose's Netted. She explores the Dark Web as seen by two people who are different in their approaches to the seamier side of the Internet but still end up becoming its victims.

Dale demonstrates the dangers of online dating and how we really don't know with whom we contact on social media. He's coming off of the end of a long-term relationship. His protective sister, Diane encourages him to use Going Out, a dating app for a rebound relationship. He gets in touch with Marla and after three weeks, goes to see her in person.

What starts out as a typical romantic comedy of "getting to know you" awkwardness and idle chit chat between a lonely gamer and his new eccentric germaphobe date gets darker and more sinister after she offers him a drink. Suddenly, he feels sleepy and this Manic Pixy Dream Girl is more like a Creepy Demonic Nightmare Woman. She attacks him and appears to be at the behest of someone else named "Paul" who hints that she is supposed to kidnap him for unspecified reasons.

The change in tone from romance to horror in Dale's section is intentional, but the change in the next segment is horror all the way through and that makes it more memorable,not just horror in the graphic things that happen but horror in the mind of the protagonist and the people around her.

The featured character in this segment is Jessica, a troubled high school student who had been abandoned by her mother and is estranged from her father and his new family. Instead she lives with her foul mouthed grandmother. She is frequently bullied at school and her only emotional release is watching The Silent Red Room, a dark web series starring the enigmatic, Father Paul.

The Silent Red Room's concept is that people are kidnapped by viewer request and then tortured at the behest of those who watch. Jessica uses the show to satisfy her blood lust and need for revenge. Her rage and desire for vengeance reaches its tipping point after  Brandy, her best friend is the victim of a cruel prank by Franny, a mean girl that ends up on social media. When the prank is turned and Franny is cyberstalked and threatened, she commits suicide. Brandy feels sorry for the girl, but Jessica feels nothing except pride in her involvement in Franny's humiliation and later death. 

While one could say that Jessica was getting back at Brandy's mistreatment, there is more than enough evidence to suggest that Jessica only used Brandy as an excuse and is as cold blooded to her as she is to anyone else. Her only real interest is to emulate the torture that she sees on The Silent Red Room and to catch the interest of Father Paul. She is a true psychopath and lives for her dark fantasies and little else.

Dale and Jessica's stories come together on the set of the Silent Red Room where they meet Father Paul and his Merry Band of Torturers face to face. The two struggle to escape: Dale from a situation in which he knows nothing about and Jessica from a place that she knows all too well and is suddenly aware that she should be careful what she wishes for. The climax shows the depths of the Dark Web in which the bloodiest fantasies become reality and things are definitely not what they seem.

Netted:The Beginning is a strong start to a series that explores the Dark Web. If this introduction is any indication, it should be a dark mesmerizing voyage into the unseen Internet indeed.