#HORRIFYING. TERRIFYING. I WISH I HAD SENT A MESSAGE TO HIM BACK IN FUCKING JULY THE FIRST TIME I WANTED TO SEND A MESSAGE TO HIM.

[justinefrischmanngf]

i’m sooooooooo stressed about a message i just sent but i am glad i sent it bc if i hadn’t i would’ve spent the rest of however long thinking about sending it and i don’t like that at all but also my heart is literally pounding in my chest what if he hates me and doesn’t want to be friends anymore…………………

#I DONT LIKE BREACHING THE COWORKER VS FRIEND BOUNDARY BECAUSE MY BOUNDARIES ARE SO THIN BUT I AM ALWAYS TERRIFIED OF PUSHING SOMEONE ELSE #TOO FAR!!!!!!!!!!!!! BUT ALSO THIS GUY AND I SPENT SO LONG BITCHING TOGETHER SATURDAY NIGHT AT A PARTY AND HE SMOKED MANY OF MY CIGARETTES #SO HOW MUCH CAN HE REALLY HATE ME #I AM SO FULL OF ADRENALINE RIGHT NOW THIS IS SO SCARY IVE GOT MY PHONE ON DO NOT DISTURB BECAUSE I DONT WANT TO KNOW WHEN HE REPLIES #HORRIFYING. TERRIFYING. I WISH I HAD SENT A MESSAGE TO HIM BACK IN FUCKING JULY THE FIRST TIME I WANTED TO SEND A MESSAGE TO HIM. #HORRIBLE HORRIBLE STUFF AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH #IF I FUCK THIS UP THEN I DO ACTUALLY FUCK THINGS UP QUITE SEVERELY BC HE IS ONE OF THE PEOPLE I MOST ENJOY HAVING CONVERSATIONS WITH JUST #IN GENERAL. BUT ALSO. I KNOW HE LIKES HAVING CONVERSATIONS WITH ME AS WELL SO IT SHOULDNT FUCK IT UP TOO MUCH #BUT WHAT IF IT DOESSSSSSSSDD #AND THEN I HAVE TO SEE HIM. AT WORK. ON THURSDAY. #THIS COULD GO SO WRONG BUT IT ALSO MIGHT BE THE START OF A LOVELY ABILITY TO TEXT CASUALLY #WHICH IS WHAT IM AIMING FOR BUT JESUS CHRIST AM I SCARED RIGHT NOW #HOLY FUCK!!!!!!!!!! I FEEL SO SCARED

[thatyanderecritic]

Stolen: A letter to my Captor

Title: Stolen: A letter to my Captor

Media: Novel, Written by Lucy Christopher

Yandere(s): Tyler “Ty” MacFarlane

Yandere Scale: 5/5

Criticism written by: Kai

Editor: Julie

The Review:

When Julie and I first got this story recommendation, we were admittedly terrified in what we would uncover. We were still recovering from the horrors that was Deathless...So, we were skeptical about any book recommendations we would get. But to our surprise, Stolen contained one of the best yanderes we have seen to date. We were both fascinated by Ty and fell in love with him. Truth be told, Ty now has the “#1 Yandere” trophy from ThatYandereCritic. It’s official y’all. Let’s review, Stolen: A letter to my Captor

Now then, if anyone wants to read the sparknotes for this story, you can find it here. I should warn you all that the creator of this sparknotes is a highly opinionated normie. So just read it for the straight up facts and ignore the snarky comments the writer likes to make in the summary. And for those who don’t want to read the sparknotes, here’s the TL;DR of the story. On a trip with her family to Vietnam, Gemma was drugged and kidnapped by Ty. He takes her all the way to a home he built in the Australian outback; miles away from the nearest city. Of course, Gemma goes ballistic and tries multiple escape attempts. But of course, she fails each time due to her stupidity or lack of ability to escape. And with each escape attempt, Ty is there to rescue her. Eventually, Stockholm Syndrome kicks in and Gemma falls in love with Ty. But ever suffering from Stupid Protagonist Syndrome, Gemma gets bitten by a venomous snake because she’s running around barefoot like a goddamn animal. Knowing that Gemma needs a doctor, Ty drives Gemma all the way back to civilization. Being a true MVP that he was, Ty even went with Gemma on the plane so that she isn’t lonely; taking the risk of getting arrested. Ty is convicted and sent to jail while Gemma is trying to get over her Stockholm Syndrome by writing Ty letters. Still mind boggling that an educated 16 year old doesn’t know what Stockholm Syndrome is till a psychiatrist told her. Weird flex but okay.

Stolen reminds me very much of the TV show You (that we reviewed awhile back). Both stories have fantastic yanderes but have the worst female protagonist. While Gemma wasn’t as bad as Beck, Gemma reminded me of a more tamed version of Beck. As Julie said, “The yanderes always fall for the stupid ones.” Seriously, Gemma doesn’t bring anything new to the table for “female protagonist in yandere stories”. The only thing unique was that she had Stockholm Syndrome but unfortunately that didn’t last long. Sigh… the normies strike again (I’m joking. Put down your pitchforks). From a normal person’s perspective, they probably view Gemma as a sympathetic character. Honestly, not really hard to imagine the message this book is trying to send. Lucy wasn’t exactly subtle with her message of “the blurring of lines and how an author can romanticize horrifying events.”  But here at ThatYandereCritic, we’re looking at this with the lenses of “yandere fans”. So let’s chuck that “rational” view right out the window! Let me take a moment to talk about Gemma. While Gemma might not be the worst female protagonist out there (Beck from You takes that cake), she is quite up there on the list. She’s a bit irrational at times, doesn’t act like an educated human being, and a bit overly emotional. Like, come on. Who walks around barefoot in a hot desert like a goddamn cretin? And it’s not like she has the excuse that she’s used to the area. She had a pampered life back in London for crying out loud! As a person who actually grew up in the desert, everything Gemma does isn’t logical for a matter of survival. And this isn’t information reserved for people living in the desert. Let me tell you, I can count the number of times I ran around barefoot outside in the desert. It isn’t fun and you’re quick to learn to wear shoes. You want to know what happens when you’re walking around barefoot in 100 degree weather? The skin at your feet start peeling a shit ton and you have actual burns on the base of your feet. It’s not impossible to walk but it’s like you have millions of needles under your feet and that you need to remove your skin to have some relief. Need I say more? So an elegant miss like Gemma would be freaking the fuck out running barefoot all the time. And she absolutely does not get a “dumb pass” because she’s still young. She’s 16. Not fucking 12. She should at least have a sense of self preservation and learn from her mistakes. Unless… education back in the UK is that bad? Hey UK fans out there! Is the schooling system that bad? I thought the US education is shit but this book is making me have some questions. Mind you, this was published in 2009. So the time period would be somewhere in the 2000’s. So this isn’t a scenario where you could say “It was a different time back then. Education was different.” But enough about Gemma, let’s finally move to the main dish: Ty. Ho ho boy was he a treat. He was an absolute sweetheart ever since the beginning of the book. First, it’s very clear that he’s lovesick. Ty stalked Gemma for six years, plotted her kidnapping for two years, saved her from almost getting raped, and more. When researching this novel, I saw several reviews state that Ty has “mood swings” but to be honest, Ty’s emotional responses were pretty rational. Gemma acted like a moronic animal and then Ty got angry at her actions. Seems pretty normal to me. But more than anything, what was telling about Ty is how he handled it. The way these other reviewers described his “mood swings”, I thought he would lash out at Gemma like a sadistic yandere. But nope! Ty handled his anger like a champ and put it into something productive. For example: Gemma was terrified shitless when she entered a dark room with Ty. Ty tells her not to panic and not to move till he turns on the light. You know what she does? She freaks the fuck out and makes a mess. Turning on the light, it’s revealed that he was painting in the room and Gemma ruined the painting Ty been working on for days. It was cleared that Ty was angry, but he never lashed out at her. Instead, he started crying and looked at the bright side of things by saying, “Well, I guess you made the painting even better since I love you.”

Seriously, I know many artists who would fucking murder you if you pulled some shit like that. Ty was nothing but a sweetheart to Gemma and was trying to look out for her the best way he could. Ty is a prime example on how a character can be a yandere without necessarily being violent. Hell, Ty doesn’t even have a “Yandere Snap” moment but was still a fantastic yandere.  He was never violent with Gemma (besides carrying her around).  He was even willing to take her back to the city in four months if Gemma really hated the outback. I will admit he was a bit odd mentally… making me think he’s an Australian version of Tarzan. But it wasn’t bad. He wasn’t so far off that you couldn’t understand him. In fact, you’re able to sympathize with him, which was great. Ty isn’t exactly a Redeemed Yandere, but he is a Good Yandere. He was a yandere that doesn’t really change, but he has Gemma interest at heart. He was even willing to go with her even though he knows that he’ll get arrested. What a good yandere *cries*. I guess the only bad thing about Ty is the fact that he’s sort of a… pedophile? He’s 26 and Gemma is 16. He started stalking her when she was 6. Personally, I wished that he took her when she was 18 to make this less weird. But I guess you can’t win everything when it comes to yandere stories, huh? There always got to be something. But after Happy Sugar Life, I’m not even surprised anymore. Sigh...

To finish this review, I do want to say that it was neat that Gemma got Stockholm Syndrome. It’s rare to see that with yandere stories for us. But unfortunately, Ty never got his happy ending and Gemma didn’t lie at court. Drat *snaps finger*. But anyways, there’s the tea Stolen. Can’t say the story itself was good. While the second person point of view was a neat gimmick, Gemma’s monkey brain narration was unbearable. You can’t exactly enjoy Ty as a yandere with Gemma being so hostile tbh. I guess she becomes bearable once she gets stockholm syndrome but ain’t nobody got time for that. Reading the sparknotes was much more interesting since we got straight into the action and minus the bullshit. Bonus is that there’s a lot less snark compared to the actual book! Nice!

(Post edit: Julie here, I just want to say that Ty was a man that was after my own heart. As for Gemma...We could do better in terms of a female protagonist)

Overall Score: 8/10

#Stolen: A letter to my Captor #Lucy Christopher #male yandere #yandere #opinion #review #book