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    Nerve
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    Nerve
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    Nerve
    Ebook281 pages4 hours

    Nerve

    By Jeanne Ryan

    3.5/5

    ()

    Unavailable in your country

    Unavailable in your country

    About this ebook

    Black Mirror meets Pretty Little Liars in this novel full of action, suspense and hot romance. Now a major film on Amazon Prime starring Emma Roberts, Dave Franco and Juliette Lewis!

    Are you playing the game, or is the game playing you?

    A high-stakes online game of dares turns deadly.

    Vee doesn't know if she has the guts to play NERVE, an online game of high-stakes dares. With Ian on her team, it's easy to agree to another dare. And another. And another. At first it's thrilling, as the manipulative audience, or 'Watchers', cheer them on to riskier challenges. But things quickly get out of hand. Just how far will Vee go before she loses NERVE?

    Praise for Nerve:
    'Ryan's story is thought-provoking and unsettling...the ending goes off with a bang and a twist.' Publishers Weekly
    'Ryan questions the nature of entertainment and explores the concept of privacy in a world of increasingly sophisticated social media. Teens will find themselves drawn in by the story's possibilities, and unNERVEd by its outcome. Give this to Suzanne Collins's Hunger Games fans.' School Library Journal
    'The commentary on today's life-as-public-spectacle society is sound. The pacing is relentless, and readers will find themselves flipping madly to the very last page.' Kirkus Reviews 

    Also by Jeanne Ryan
    Charisma
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSimon & Schuster UK
    Release dateJul 28, 2016
    ISBN9781471146176
    Unavailable
    Nerve
    Author

    Jeanne Ryan

    Jeanne Ryan has lived all over the world, raised in a family with eleven brothers and sisters. She spent her early childhood in Hawaii and the rest of her growing-up years trying to figure out a way to get back there, with stops in South Korea , Michigan and Germany along the way. Before writing fiction, she tried her hand at many things, including wargame simulation and youth development research. But she decided it was much more fun to work on stories than statistics. These days, she still loves Hawaii but has found her home under the moody skies of the Pacific Northwest. www.jeanneryan.com

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    Reviews for Nerve

    3.5/5

    91 ratings10 reviews

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    • 2/5
      I usually reserve two stars for really bad books (the coveted 1 star remains, I believe, only awarded to that Cinderella mess from a couple years back). But this year when I look back on the books I’ve rated as three stars, they are all better than this one. So keep that in mind.

      I picked this up because the Pajiba review of the film that came out earlier this year was pretty good. I’ve just gone back and re-read the review and it looks like the filmmakers took the names and premise from the book but changed pretty much everything else. Probably for the best.

      In case you don’t know the premise, here it is: there’s a real-time live action game show that involves individuals signing up to complete recorded dares for prizes. Vee, tired of being outshined by her best friend, decides to sign up.

      But let’s back up. The book starts out with a prologue that – spoiler alert – is never resolved. I mean, we figure out (sort of) what happens, but still. Not great writing.

      Anyway, you don’t know the prologue never gets resolved until the end of the book. So yay for that. But the next glaring problem is that a 17-year-old in Washington state would be able to sign up for this game without parental permission. Moving past that, the naiveté of the main character is sort of mind boggling. I suppose it’s necessary for the plot, but I’m not sure.

      It all takes place in Seattle over the course of I think three days, so the action is compact. The dares increase in difficulty / awkwardness / danger, until the ‘grand finale’ dare, which is so ridiculous. Like, I get that some young people make poor decisions, but come on.

      Also, there’s this weird storyline about how maybe the main character tried to kill herself at some point, which doesn’t really totally get resolved.

      Then the book ends, there’s an epilogue sort of (which again doesn’t address the prologue at all – it’s like it never happened), and then it’s over. I read it in a day, and I’m not mad I read it, it just wasn’t good.
    • 4/5
      First things first. Great story, some interesting characters, and some decent twists and turns. Where this goes wrong is the ending. Don't get me wrong, I liked how it ended. Perfectly creepy, except for the beginning. The prologue. It hinted at something more happening, but yet nothing happened with that. It is kind of annoying to not have that loose end tied up. Other than that, still a decent book worth reading.

      It follows V, a girl who is tired of feeling invisible and applies to participate in a game called Nerve. Nerve is basically a game of truth or dare, minus the truth, that is broadcast for the world to see, for a fee. For each dare, you are given prizes. The more you do, the bigger the prizes. Things start to get out of control for V and her partner, Ian and they work to end it once and for all.
    • 4/5
      The biggest problem with this story is that the main characters are not very sympathetic. They get involved with this hideous game and don't get out because of greed. I also didn't get the connection between the first scene in the book and the ending.
    • 3/5
      In the unspecified near future, a reality game called NERVE, tempts potential players into uploading live, unedited video of the completion of increasingly difficult dares in exchange for prizes. Teenage Vee isn't normally the type of person who would participate but, while she enjoys working backstage on school plays, she's tired of being backstage in her own life, following the lead of her popular friend and pining for a guy she thinks is out of her league. In a spontaneous moment, Vee completes what seems like an innocuous dare and discovers that even simple, innocent acts can have unintended consequences. But maybe just one more dare...Jeanne Ryan's creation is all too believable - NERVE players are lured (via the ubiquitous cell phone) by greed and notoriety and exploited by the personal information they've shared online, all for the purpose of mass entertainment. NERVE even encourages non-players (called Watchers) to participate from the sidelines. There are too many characters for real development and the narrative develops haphazardly to a resolution that will not satisfy all readers but Ryan's story is a chillingly realistic portrayal of the societal steps that might lead from a reality-tv present to a Hunger-Games future.
    • 3/5
      Nerve felt very bland for me. All through the book I felt as if I'd read this before - and in some ways, I had. There are plenty of similarities between Nerve and The Hunger Games. So much so that I began to lose interest in reading it.
    • 5/5
      Now this is an enthralling and excited book! I adored the plot and how different it was.What I enjoyed most about this book is the plot. Do you have nerve to walk into a store, and cluck like chicken for $50? How about telling your best friend what really happen at the party for $500? This is what makes it so exciting to read. The pranks start off small and harmless. Then they become dangerous as well as personal. Each time the prank got bigger I held my breath. I kept shaking my head thinking, "No, she won't do it." And then SHE DID! Holy crapola! This chick got some nerve!!Beside the amazing plot, the reader is presented with an unlikely character who takes some big, brave steps. Vee is shy and girl who always gets over-looked. She's smart and has a lot to offer. What better way to get notice by doing something your friends know you will not go through with. After Vee finishes her fist dare, she is off like a rocket!There is a love interest that occurred that I did not see coming. I was thinking it go the other way with the other guy, but hot diggity dog this author can write! I loved the twist and turns it that came along with this love. Lies upon lies, peeled back like an onion, making everything is exposed. This love interest got better and better.Nerve is an adrenaline rush filled story! The madness and rebellion to continue to do each dare makes your heart beat faster. The conniving owners of Nerve won'st stop till they get the last word. They will manipulate you into thinking it is all a game. Do you have Nerve?
    • 5/5
      First things first: GO PREORDER THIS BOOK because it is amazing! Ryan creates a situation where Vee (who is incredibly identifiable in all her behind the scenes--literally--glory) is sucked into an incredibly crazy situation where the stakes just keep going up. The pace is fantastic and kept me up way late at night as I just couldn't put it down. Ryan's teen voice, too, is awesome. The way she portrays the social structure of the school and world of the game were spot-on. And Ian's just downright delightful :) And, despite a few things that happen (I don't want to be spoiler-y, I kind of like Tommy lots...). So, if you're looking for a great, fast, edge-of-your-seat read, check out Nerve!
    • 3/5
      Vee is usually happy to hide behind the scenes. She literally works there during stage productions for her high school while her best friend and crush perform center stage. On the spur of the moment, she decides to try out for NERVE, a game dares broadcasted online, by humiliating herself at a local coffee shop. Because of an unforeseen reveal, she finds herself in the next round with a prize being dangled in front of her. After discovering her crush likes her best friend, Vee decides to be someone she's not and go through with the game. The Watchers, viewers who can watch either in person or on the internet, love her and she becomes and internet sensation. As the dares get riskier and the stakes higher, the game becomes dangerous, even life threatening. Can Vee beat NERVE with her family and friends intact?Nerve isn't really what I expected, but it wasn't horrible. The concept is interesting. Teens perform a series of dares that increase in difficulty for money and prizes specifically tailored to what they want. Over time, it becomes clear that the NERVE company knows about every dirty secret they have to manipulate and motivate them. The book has a good commentary on consumerism and entertainment. How far would you go to get what you want? These people do some embarrassing things and hurt the people they love in order to get some prizes, money, and fame. They justified it to themselves in order to gloss over how bad things really were. People can get caught up in consumerism and forget about what really matters. Nerve explores how entertainment can mean people getting hurt and their privacy being violated. The contestants on the show have their deepest, darkest secrets laid bare for millions of people to watch. They only do those humiliating and hurtful things because there is a market and an audience to watch, This perspective might make somebody think twice before they watch a horrible and exploitative reality TV show.I have a few problems with the book. When I saw the cover of Nerve and read the premise, I expected life threatening, dangerous situations for money and prizes like the film Would You Rather. It even says it's for fans of The Hunger Games, which it doesn't resemble in any way at all. It only turns deadly at the very end and not very impressively. The dares are a bit underwhelming. The lack of character development and the use of instalove is annoying. I didn't really connect to the characters at all. Vee's best friend also struck me as pretty horrible, humiliating her friend in front of millions for 15 seconds of fame. At the very end, my suspension of disbelief hit its wall and the story went into the realm of ridiculous. Overall, Nerve is a plot driven novel that explores relevant issues on entertainment and consumerism. The writing did suck me in and I read the book almost in one sitting because I was curious about where it was going to go.
    • 3/5
      I enjoyed reading this book. I recommend it to all. excited to watch movie
    • 5/5
      Sick and Twisted. Seriously it's reality show gone bad. Vee has decided to be daring and unpredictable as no one would've have expected her to join the game. At first she enjoys the thrill and the cool prizes don't hurt either. Plus, she gets the added bonus of hot teammate, Ian to sweeten the deal. Yet, how much of this is just a game and how much more of it is a crazy sadistic game orchestrated by some unknown weirdo’s that know her every move.

      Vee appears to be a timid, shy girl that lives in the background of her world. She pines for the leading man Matthew in the school play, which she works on as the make-up artist. The closing night she gets heartbroken when she the kiss between her best friend Syd and Matthew lasts much longer than it should onstage and it changes everything for Vee. She becomes someone even she doesn't know and takes big risks that are so out of her character.

      Now, personally I would have been much more skeptical than Vee about how these people know so much personal information. This makes me want to close down my Facebook page, grief. What I love about this book is Vee's growth; she becomes stronger and more confident in herself. The writing conveys the emotions of the characters deliciously. I liked the mystery and the intrigue of who are these Nerve people controlling this game and what do they get out it all. Some, well most of the activities that happen in this book are freaking creepy and scary...just plain wrong on so many levels. The Watchers of the game are as delusional and naive as the players who may come to realize too late that it is more than just a game. Nerve is edge of your seat good, and I hope there is more.