Review: Lack of Influence (A Review of Hate Follow by Erin Quinn-Kong)

 By Hugh Blanton

 

In 2019 native New Yorker Joe Nicchi founded CVT Soft Serve ice cream in Los Angeles after he became frustrated over not being able to find good soft serve anywhere in the West Coast city. He fixed up an old ice cream truck and hit the streets. LA being LA, it wasn't long until the Instagram and TikTok influencers started hitting up Joe for free products in exchange for "exposure." Then came an email to Joe from an influencer wanting to be comped 300 free servings during an LA event the influencer would be hosting. Joe replied "Hard pass." The parasites kept showing up at his truck and Joe quickly tired of it. "We truly don't care if you're an influencer, or how many followers you have. We will never give you free ice cream in exchange for a post on your social media page. It's literally a $4 item...well now it's $8 for you." He posted a sign on his ice cream truck saying prices were double for influencers. "Without sounding like a douchebag, I think our product speaks for itself. The ice cream is the influencer," Joe said.

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Hate Follow is the debut novel from Erin Quinn-Kong. Influencer Wendy Golden has a million followers on Instagram where she details her home life and advertises products (clothing, makeup, health & beauty). Readers of Hate Follow are asked to suspend a little disbelief when we are told that Wendy's fifteen-year-old daughter Mia has never seen her mom's Instagram until one day she decides to take a peek and is mortified at what she sees: pictures of herself, her sisters, her brother, and—most appalling of all—pictures of her father's funeral. (He'd died of a heart attack four years prior.) Mia confronts her mother and demands that it all be taken down. Mom says no dice. Mia leaves home in protest and stays at her best friend's house. Her best friend's dad suggests that Mia sue her mom. They consult with an attorney and he takes Mia's case. Pro bono.

 

Anyone familiar with the parent-child immunity doctrine will roll their eyes at such a lawsuit—the doctrine prevents children from suing their parents (and vice versa). Of course, exceptions can be made and Hate Follow tries, however unconvincingly, to explain itself here. Attorney Caleb Bradford says, "Your mother is not an average parent. She has a huge audience and is posting deeply personal images and stories about you. That's a big deal." Previous child/parent suits that have been allowed in US courts were put forward because of abuse or criminal conduct, which actually are big deals, unlike a blog or Instagram account. In reality, no judge would let a case like this proceed in his courtroom. When Mia is speaking to a reporter from her high school newspaper she says one aspect of her case will be Coogan Law. Again—unlikely, especially in Texas where our story takes place. Coogan Law only applies in California, New York, Illinois, and New Mexico. Even if Texas had a Coogan Law on its books, it would not apply here. Named after child actor Jackie Coogan, it protects the earnings of minors working in sports and entertainment industries. Mia was not a paid employee of her mother, and the earnings her mother made from her blogging would not be subject to Coogan Law anyway. (Jackie Coogan successfully got some of his money back from his mother after he turned twenty-one and went on to play Uncle Fester in the sitcom series The Addams Family.)

 

How successful is Wendy Golden's blog? We find out right from the beginning:

Surveying her home's expansive living area, Whitney Golden was proud of the lavish winter wonderland she'd created. There were not one, not two, but three Christmas trees - one decorated in dazzling shades of gold; another all white, from the lights to the star on top; and the third, set up on the back patio overlooking the pool, with old-fashioned glass ornaments that reminded her of a Norman Rockwell painting.

 

Count 'em! Three trees! Wendy also pays thousands of dollars in bail money for her no-good brother Brendan who keeps landing in jail. (Her mortgage is $8K a month.) Wendy's blog, wendygolden.com, is an actual domain name for a freelance photographer; hopefully, the real Wendy isn't getting bombarded with stan messages.

 

Quinn-Kong says, "I hope Hate Follow starts a bigger conversation about children and social media." No doubt it could have if the niggling little plot holes regarding actual law had been taken care of. Even with its problems, Hate Follow builds enormous tension as the court date nears and we wonder what could happen to Wendy's lucrative social media career and how the mother/daughter relationship will fare. (Mia visits home on Christmas day as the case is working its way through the court.) However, the ending just falls flat; so flat that a reader might ask what the point of the previous three hundred pages were. Quinn-Kong would also do well to toss her thesaurus, too many characters do way too much "sauntering." And the shtick of Zoomers blaming the Boomers for climate change is getting a little old.

Hugh Blanton's latest book is Kentucky Outlaw. He can be reached on X: @HughBlanton5