Book Review - Keanu Reeves Is Not in Love With You by Becky Holmes

A funny yet sensitive examination of online romance scams and how they're perpetrated.

Holmes starts Keanu Reeves is Not in Love With You with tongue-in-cheek absurdity. It is a joy to read her bizarre responses to strange men on social media love-bombing her in the hopes of extorting money through gift cards and bitcoin. I particularly adore her snappy non-sequiturs in the face of such blatant yet misspelled ambition. The chats she had with the likes of 'Liam Neeson', 'Brad Pitt' and, of course, 'Keanu Reeves' are particularly stellar.

Then, at the midway point Holmes shifts gears and shares how she has been manipulated by serial liars in the past before introducing a host of women who have had their goodwill and emotional vulnerability exploited for eye-watering amounts of money. These women that society too often declares gullible and foolish have in fact been put through intense trauma by young boys with a chip on their shoulder and a whole script book of psychological tricks.

This brings me to the aspect of this book I found most fascinating: the Sakawa Boys of Ghana and the Yahoo Boys of Nigeria. It's a sad fact that a lot of scams still originate in these countries, where wayward youth have adopted them as their primary income. Not only are they organised and work in shifts to toy with the emotions and bank accounts of Western women, these boys employ ritualistic magic in the hopes that it will make their 'clients' more susceptible. This can range from strange public displays to the maiming and even killing of young victims.

Suffice to say I didn't expect a book with such a daft title to go so deep and dark. Nevertheless I am grateful to Holmes for opening my eyes to the twisted subculture behind sudden and unexpected romantic encounters on the internet. Also the humour was pitch perfect too.

I recommend Keanu Reeves is Not in Love with You to anyone who has ever been approached by an attractive stranger online and wondered how such scammers operate

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