Deadstream by Mar Romasco-Moore (I Am the Ghost in Your House) is an addictive, anxiety-provoking YA thriller in which livestreamers mysteriously die after an entity that is visible only on-screen shows up in their videos.
Seventeen-year-old Teresa suffers severe agoraphobia after surviving the car wreck that killed her best friend, Becks--a death for which she feels responsible. Now, she locks herself in her bedroom for days at a time, going live online as Replay, an "entirely genderless" gamer ("the way she'd like to be") for a small cadre of followers. It is perhaps her ongoing grief that compels her to investigate when her fellow livestreamers start falling prey to a frightening phenomenon. The incidents begin with a command in chat: "open the door." Freaked-out viewers type warnings ("omg don't go in there") that go unheeded, and a mysterious being appears behind the livestreamer--not physically, but on the screen. Brick, one such victim, subsequently goes catatonic on a marathon stream while his massive fan-base wonders if he's acting. Teresa attempts to help Brick by effectively doxxing him, leading to her channel being banned midstream. Then, a trans friend who best understands and supports Teresa, Ozma, succumbs to the same sinister syndrome. To stop the shadow entity and save Ozma, Teresa will have to act outside the safe confines of her home.
This unsettling third-person narrative includes mixed media (livestream transcripts, text messages, online forums, DMs, and social media posts), creating a fully immersive, incessantly creepy experience that allows for startling jump scares. Chat feeds especially amp up the pacing as the "seething mass of hungry eyes egg[s] streamers on," and the sleuthing captured in online spaces demands compulsive reading. Romasco-Moore convincingly portrays a teen whose persistent trauma warps her perception of reality: "She just needs to take the splinter out. It's fine. It's such a small thing. But a small thing can kill you." This anxiety, "a faint but persistent hum," rings true, as does her connection with Ozma, "her one shining star" who can soothe her panic attacks. That Teresa must overcome paralyzing fear to save Ozma ("Why couldn't this be someone else's responsibility? Someone brave, someone sane") is an important and practical depiction by the author. Teresa's love of streaming is beautifully rendered (it "feels almost like the viewers are there with her, like they are all one big organism"). Other teen worries, small and large, like view counts and online death threats, also feature in this frightening, queer-centric tale. --Samantha Zaboski, freelance editor and reviewer
Shelf Talker: This pulse-pounding supernatural thriller follows a teen streamer who must face her agoraphobia to stop an invisible entity from killing her online friends.