How Do Booktok Bad Trends Affect Readers' Book Choices?

Willow Fletcher never asked for Ridgeway Academy. To her, the school was a fortress of wealth and privilege, where polished smiles masked sharp cruelty. But when the scholarship came, she had no choice but to step into its glittering, dangerous halls. Sweet, soft, and unworldly, Willow stood out the moment she arrived. The whispers began instantly, mockery laced with jealousy. No matter how kind she was, Ridgeway’s elite branded her an outsider. Yet, envy followed her every step. With her porcelain skin and delicate beauty, she was impossible to ignore. Especially to him. Ian Blackwood. Ridgeway’s crown jewel. The untouchable guy with a smile girls would burn for and a heart made of ice. Brilliant, composed, devastatingly charming, he was everything they wanted, and the very reason they ended up shattered. His friends thrived on games and chaos, but Ian? Ian preferred precision. A silent hunter. And Willow had caught his eye. She wasn’t desperate for him, and that was her mistake. Her innocence tempted him, and temptation was something Ian never resisted. When his friends dared him to make her fall, he accepted without hesitation. Because Willow Fletcher wasn’t just another conquest. She was a challenge. And Willow Fletcher was the kind of challenge he intended to savour before destroying

I had just left the hospital after undergoing a dilation and curettage procedure for uterine fibroids. On the bus, I happened to encounter a woman who was crying and claiming she had menstrual cramps and a terrible stomachache, asking me to give up my seat. But I refused. I never expected the woman to be the famous internet influencer, Bella Marsh. While I was completely unprepared, she started a livestream, and the next day, I was violently attacked online and pushed onto the trending searches. Netizens even dug up the record of my procedure at the hospital. “With a uterine wall that thin, it’s obvious she has had so many failed pregnancies.” “No wonder she was so shameless and refused to give up her seat—turns out she’s a despicable woman.” The so-called righteous netizens harassed me until I fell into depression, and even my boyfriend stepped forward to accuse me of being dirty and said he wanted to break up. Unable to endure the blow, I jumped from the rooftop, while the female influencer gained tens of millions of followers and began livestream selling, earning more money than she could count. Only after my death did I learn that the influencer had been my boyfriend’s childhood crush. To boost the popularity of her livestream, she and my boyfriend had deliberately staged the entire scene. When I opened my eyes again, I had returned to the very day Bella asked me to give up my seat.

As the male lead, Henry Johnston, forces himself on me, a row of comments suddenly appears before my eyes. "Henry is about to misunderstand and think Aria drugged him! The angst is about to begin!" "I'm thrilled just thinking about Henry regretting dearly after Aria dies!" "Keep up the act, Henry. After she dies, you'll be hugging her corpse and crying every day." That is when I realize that I am the tragic female lead in a story where I am destined to be tormented until I die. The readers treat my death as a highlight to push the plot forward. They are counting down to my death. As I look at Henry, who is panting on top of me, anger courses through me. I grab a table lamp and smash it into him, killing him on the spot. Who says that the one who dies in a toxic romance story must always be the female lead?

My roommate had a peculiar knack for pestering everyone into liking her posts on social media, all so she could collect enough likes to claim some prize or another. It was her way of life—nagging, nudging, and guilting us into clicking that little thumbs-up. One time, the campus beauty queen liked my roommate's ad for a facial mask. Not long after, she was in a horrific car accident. The vehicle caught fire, and her face suffered severe burns, leaving her disfigured beyond recognition. Meanwhile, my roommate seemed to undergo a miraculous transformation, her complexion turning porcelain fair and flawless as though she'd been kissed by the heavens. Then there was the academic prodigy, a shoe-in for graduate school, who liked her tutoring service post. Shortly after, he was exposed for academic fraud, and his once-brilliant reputation was reduced to ashes. Strangely enough, my roommate's research paper suddenly won an award, catapulting her to fame and fortune. And me? I fell into her trap too. I liked her rental agency ad, and before I knew it, my world crumbled. A scandal erupted, revealing that I was the result of a mix-up at birth. It turned out she was the long-lost child of wealth and privilege—a hidden gem cast into the rough, now reclaimed by her rightful family. As for me, I was packed off to the countryside village she had escaped from and forced into a brutal marriage with an old man. My life became a living hell, and eventually, I died there, broken and forgotten. But fate wasn't done with me yet. When I opened my eyes again, I found myself back on the day my roommate begged me to like her post in exchange for yet another prize.

Zara thought her heart only had space for one bad boy—her charming best friend Jace, the tattooed playboy who never saw her as a woman.. Zara is determined to confess her feelings to Jace before their high school prom night ends but her hopes are entirely crushed when Jace announces he has a new girlfriend and she overhears him saying she (Zara)can never be his type. This hurts Zara beyond core. Heartbroken but determined to move on, Zara steps into college with a fresh start and a shared apartment with Jace. What she doesn’t expect is him—Noah Reyes, the brooding, inked stranger in the third room. Mysterious, cold, and devastatingly magnetic, Noah has something in him she can’t name.. He never wanted roommates. He doesn’t do feelings. But there’s something about Zara that threatens his rules.. Stuck between the best friend who’s always had her heart and the mysterious bad boy next door who’s starting to steal it, Zara is caught in a storm of temptation. She has to choose—but either way, someone’s bound to get burned.

Falling for the wrong Alpha She chased the right Alpha... until the wrong one caught her heart. She’s loved him since she was ten—her best friend, her first crush, her destined mate, and the future Alpha of the pack. To her, he’s everything. But to him, she’s just a friend. When he finds his mate and it’s her, she dares to believe her love is finally returned. But her hopes are crushed when he rejects her, claiming he could never see her that way. Still, she refuses to walk away. In her heart, he’s her Right Alpha—the one she was meant to love. Then his estranged brother returns—wild, unpredictable, and nothing like him. And for the first time, someone truly sees her. Torn between the love she’s always wanted and the unexpected connection she never saw coming, she must choose: stay loyal to the boy she’s always loved or take a risk on the one who just might be right for her after all.