In this novella we follow Kayleigh as she writes a letter to a lawyer who is prosecuting her former employer. Kayleigh used to work as a content moderator for a popular social media site, and as a result was exposed to endless extremely graphic images and videos. Content that causes any number of physical and mental health problems. But Kayleigh's fine. Right?

This was a clever and chilling look into how warped our perceptions of the world become due to overexposure from graphic digital content. We see these characters start to become desensitised by what they're watching, and even become indoctrinated to the extreme message and conspiracy theories. There's a sense of overwhelming dispair and desperation that seems to seep through every page that I found really fascinating to read as each individual deals with this trauma differently - from rage to denial.

However, I do wish this had been longer. I found Kayleigh's story arc to be less hard hitting than it was probably intended to be purely because you don't really see this gradual, creeping build up of the destruction that takes them unawares. Instead it jumps forward in time quite quickly, implying rather than letting the reader see it for themselves. I also found that although Kayleigh is a complex, nuanced character, we don't get the same treatment from her coworkers. If the story had been longer we probably would have been given better back stories for them, and seeing their trauma would have had a stronger emotional impact.

Facinating examination on a very real and prevelant topic, but I was left desperately wanting more. Also, extreme trigger warnings. For such a short read I found this impossible to read in one go due to the graphic content.

This novella made me consider a side to social media that I had not given much thought to previously: the psychological effects on the content moderators that are employed by these organisations.

Protagonist Kayleigh is vulnerable to the manipulations of others in her personal life. Through her eyes, we witness the insipid effects of the content and judgements that she and her workmates engage in daily.

The story is told simply through the first-person perspective. It does not revel in the gratuitousness of what Kaleigh and her colleagues are exposed to but gives enough to help the reader understand the damaging effects of the role on the mental health, views and opinions and the boundaries of those whose days are spent reviewing hundreds of tagged posts.

"This Post Has Been Removed" exposes the cold, clinical rules that are the handbook of the companies' assessments. As an educator who has had cause to report unkind posts in the past, I have a greater understanding of how those posts I had concerns come back with No Violation.

I am sure we have all reported something on social media that hasn't been removed for breaking guidelines and thought - why the hell not?! This book takes you on a disturbing tour of what life as an internet moderator is really like.

I have to be honest - it isn't something I really thought about. That a real person has to sit there and look through all this awful content of which I am sure everyone who is on social media has come across at one time or another. But there are people out there who for them, this is how they pay their bills. And the rules are actually shockingly strict.

This is a short book that packs a dark punch. What happens to Kayleigh and her colleagues as they are exposed to more and more of this brutal content is deeply disturbing and you have to wonder how anyone can keep doing the job for long. The ending was sudden but unexpected and leaves you with a lot to think about. I can't say I enjoyed the book as that seems strange but it was an insightful, haunting and timely read for sure.

A dark novella detailing the experiences and relationships of an online content moderator. They become desensitized to traumatic events, categorizing everything, while their coworkers are being radicalized by conspiracy theorists. Not for the faint hearted.
I was gripped by this, but found the ending to be abrupt and unsatisfying.
Thank you NetGalley and Pan MacMillan for the ARC.

Kayleigh has been employed by Hexa for a larger company, her job is to review content flagged online for deletion and check the guidelines to see whether it stays up or not. Others around her are crumbling under the content they’re viewing and targets set by the company. Kayleigh isn’t bothered because she’s got her coworker Sigrid to take her mind off things and they’re fine, right?
I was very pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed this book. It’s a lot shorter than I anticipated but I think that works well. It’s told from Kayleigh’s perspective, she’s recounting her time at Hexa to a lawyer. I thought the premise was unique and carried out well. The translation was very well done. I read the whole thing in one sitting, it was a compulsive and short read. The only thing I was unsure of was the ending, I sort of got what was symbolised there but I didn’t find it particularly satisfying. Overall, a really intriguing book and I’d be interested to read more from this author in the future!

We Had To Remove This Post - Hanna Bervoets (translated by Emma Rault)
Psychological

Review:
We had to remove this post is an intriguing novella following the lives of people who work behind the scenes for a social media company. They have to spend their days watching disturbing content, to decide what needs to be removed. For such a short book, I found myself very invested in the main characters. It was quite chilling in places and was not always comfortable to read. Overall, a really thrilling read, that I devoured in one sitting! I would really love to see this topic explored further in a full length novel, as it felt that some stones were left unturned.

We had to remove this post involves a diverse range of characters of different races. The main two characters are LGBTQIA+.

Rating: 4/5

Trigger warnings - violence, sexual abuse, self-harm, animal cruelty, suicidal themes, holocaust denial, racism, homophobia, drug and alcohol misuse, mental health issues, possibly more that I can’t think of!

I received an advanced reader copy of this book via NetGalley but was under no obligation to provide a review.

A book about a social media moderator and the effect it has on them as they view difficult material day to day.

It's a really fascinating point of view, and I think the author really only just scratches the surface but it still has a huge impact. I'd be recommending this to horror readers a lot, because it's definitely based in real life but still difficult to read.

I've been hearing about this book for a while and it's been on my tbr so when I saw this on netgalley I knew I had to request it. Definitely a book I would recommend. I loved the story and how it led. Thank you so much

I was really intrigued by this in the beginning, especially how the job of a social media moderator works (sounds horrific), but the second half fell apart for me. It is only a short novella and I think it achieved what it set out to do but it could have been a real punchy read if it had been a little longer with more of a deep dive into the ramifications of a job so psychologically affecting.

Thank you NetGalley and Picador for the e-arc! “We Had To Remove This Post” comes out May 26th, 2022.

“We Had To Remove This Post” by Hanna Bervoets (transl. Emma Rault) is a novella about Kayleigh, a woman who works as a content moderator for a major social media site. Her job is to watch content flagged as inappropriate, spam, or abusive, and to decide whether it should be removed. “We Had To Remove This Post” awakens in the reader a morbid curiosity to see more of the shocking content the character sees, in a clever way mirroring the way social media algorithms work.

The best thing about this book is its exploration of how this job impacts Kayleigh, her relationship with her girlfriend, and her co-workers - how one of them begins to believe the conspiracy theories he has to interact with every day, how hypervigilant they are because of the trauma of their jobs. I found this insanely well-done and love the way Bervoets explores the impact such straining jobs can have on the workers’ personal life.

I also really loved how this novella forces you to reconnect in your mind the process through which you access social media to the labour that allows that access - often underpaid, traumatising, and conducted under extremely poor conditions.

My one complaint about this book is that it felt too short to fully explore its themes - I especially would have liked to see more on the conspiracy theory radicalisation of Kayleigh’s co-workers. Most importantly, I would have liked the ending to be less abrupt - the last few pages make the book feel really unfinished.

If you’re compelled by the idea of a sobering, fast-paced look at social media and the labour behind it, I highly recommend you pick up “We Had To Remove This Post”! some of the scenes in it are quite graphic, so do check out content warnings before reading.

We Had to Remove This Post follows Kayleigh who works as a content moderator for a social media firm, meaning she is subjected to the very worst of humanity every day. I was intrigued by the premise as I work in social media myself - I found the way it was written in a desensitised way very interesting but it was very brutal (I did read the trigger warnings and don’t usually have any issues with books but I found this one hard to read.)

It’s very dark and despite being less than 200 pages long it packs a real punch. My rating is to do with my personal preference and struggle with the content.

Kayleigh, the protagonist, worked as a content moderator for a company called Hexa, a job that I (and I am sure many others) have never given it much thought. On reflection, content moderators see humanity at its worst. You hear many stories in the news about the awful things people have shared online, but imagine being the person that has to see ALL OF IT. These people have to sit there and toy over the decision of having to remove these posts if they are not in line with certain policies, regardless of if they agree or disagree.

It is very clear to see that the author has conducted a hell of a lot of research on this topic. The way the psychological strain this job has on an individual is extremely well executed and very raw. The way mental health struggles are explored as a result of Kayleigh's and her colleagues experiences are explored well. The use of alcohol and drug misuse as (unhealthy) coping mechanisms begins to creep into their lives. But in their minds, they don't know what else to do. They need the money.

This is a raw, emotional and honest account of life as a content moderator. I urge anyone who wants to delve into the deep, dark world of this line of work to give this a read.

Thank you to NetGalley and Pan Macmillian for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review!

A unique and very well done book that I loved and will be recommending further - I will also definitely be reading more from Hanna Bervoets!

As someone with experience working in social media management, this was a little close to the bone at times! The protagonist works moderating social media for a tech giant (loosely disguised Facebook/Meta, I think) and We Had To Remove This Post explores the ethics and impact of such a job. Though I did not moderate the worst the internet has to offer, the insight into the feelings associated with moderating content for a living felt spot on to me. It's a really interesting and unique novel and I would definitely recommend it.

This book was definitely a winner for me, thoroughly enjoyed it and would recommend to all. Thank you to Netgalley, the author and publisher for providing me the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

This book has souch promise, and I had such high hopes for it. Unfortunately I really didn't enjoy it. It was slow and predictable

An interesting and captivating novella which delves into the dark side of social media normal users perhaps do not see.

We Had To Remove This Post is a short but hard-hitting book about a young woman who gets a job as a content moderator for an un-named social media website. Kayleigh and her colleagues spend their working life subjected to often horrific images as they trawl online content to spare the general public. Bombarded with the worst the internet has to offer many become hardened and cynical rather than shocked while at the same time being seduced by the conspiracy theories that they spend much of their working lives being subjected to.
Kayleigh begins a relationship with a workmate,Sigrid,and what they see and hear and work affects their lives outside.
For a short book this has a lot to say and is superbly written. The ending is quite abrupt which caught me out and had me thinking, "is that it?". Maybe I missed something or just didn't "get it",or maybe it's deliberately ambiguous but much as I loved the book the ending was a disappointment.

I have always been drawn to fiction that spotlights unusual jobs and that is why “We had to remove this post” caught my attention. Kayleigh is a content moderator for a social media platform, spending long shifts viewing videos other people have reported as offensive or inappropriate. Kayleigh comments that other people on her life have a lurid fascination with the posts she views, and I have to admit I was guilty of the same. What exactly do content moderators see?

It’s a short but unnerving read. I would definitely recommend checking trigger warnings for the book before you begin. I found that the jaded tone of the protagonist really drew me in to the story and highlighted the effect the work had on her. It’s a valuable and interesting insight into the world of content moderating and I was both shocked and surprised by the nuances of the rules - far more videos are kept up than I would anticipate. It makes for difficult reading but also touching in places - for example the birthday gift.

The plot felt like it lost its way towards the end of the book and then became l very frustrating at the end. It seems like the style is confused as well- it’s a letter to a lawyer but with an abrupt cliffhanger and those two elements felt out of sync. It’s clear that the author has done a ton of research into this subject, I will be sure to look up the suggestions for further reading.

Thanks to the author, publisher and Netgalley for the opportunity to review an advanced copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

This is a great book, and well translated. The narrator works in content moderation for a social media firm and spends her day deciding whether content should be taken down or not. There is a team of people inducted at the same time and we learn a little about a few of these as well. It is a novella, so could easily have had more story about each of the characters. It definitely makes you think about the work these people do, and I suspect we’ll read more books in this setting in future. The novella brings you at a fast pace through the end, but have to admit to being a little disappointed in the ending - I couldn’t quite understand what the ending was or means. Also don’t get the impact of the video. I understand this is the authors first book translated into English. It’s a great introduction to the author of whom I’d like to read more.