Review: Dial-Up and Die by P. J. Thorndyke

I finished reading Dial-up and die a couple days ago and I don’t know if it’s because I’m a millennial or what, but these creepypasta type stories get me every single time. 

There is something truly unsettling about what we used to do on the internet colliding with reality. I don’t know about you, but I was 12 years old, in AOL chatrooms, talking to people I had NO business talking to. I mean, there weren’t really any rules that I remember. Obviously we knew not to talk to strangers and give out personal info, but on the internet, we felt invisible didn’t we? I know I did.

But thinking back on all that, I feel lucky as hell. I mean ANYTHING could have happened. Remember that movie, “Megan is Missing”? THAT was terrifying. If you haven’t seen it then do so, expeditiously. 

The book follows a group of friends who, one by one, die mysteriously. I mean, these high schoolers were all up in the internet. Playing games, chatting, hacking, sharing stories, investigating websites and cracking codes. And it was like 1999-2000ish, so you already know. 

The story is written through chats, articles and blog posts so it has a very “found footage” kind of feel to it. Making it even more unsettling for me and the deeper you get into it, the weirder it gets. 

I reached out to P. J., who was super nice and willing to chat for a bit and apparently this book is part of a series that was inspired by horror movie tropes over the decades. The series is called the Celluloid Terrors and it includes 6 books:

Curse of the blood fiends

Invasion of the brain tentacle

Death Trip

Road of Souls

Twilight of Evil

Dial-up and Die

You can find these easily on Amazon.

Since I read Dial-up and Die, we got to talking a little bit about that time period and how the internet was this vast unknown playground for us as kids. We had no real idea of the possible dangers lurking there. 

All that being said, I loved the writing, loved the story and highly recommend it!

Until next time,

D. E.

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