What do you think?
Rate this book
Dot Monster ReVolution
In the wake of a historic cyber attack in the late 2020s, a governing body was formed to construct and police the successor to the world wide web. On this second internet, the vast majority of users are accompanied by sophisticated ‘Partner Programs’ called Dot Monsters.
When a group of teenagers discover a dark secret about the Dot Monster origins, they wage war against the makers of the new internet, to liberate humans and monsters alike.
Dot Monster ReVolution is an original piece of fiction. It is a love letter to the monster taming anime and games of the late 90s and early 2000s. The book is somewhere between a Light Novel and a YA novel, for all ages to enjoy.
About the CJ Van is a writer, game developer, and media lover. He's been a comics editor, a writer on big and small games, and worked in community management. Online, he is known for analyzing millennium-era anime as writer and host of TheDigiKnow on YouTube
As an anime-inspired story, this book may be described as a light novel, pop fiction, or a young adult (YA) novel. It can be enjoyed by young readers, as well as adults with a soft spot for monster tamer stories.
When a group of teenagers discover a dark secret about the Dot Monster origins, they wage war against the makers of the new internet, to liberate humans and monsters alike.
Dot Monster ReVolution is an original piece of fiction. It is a love letter to the monster taming anime and games of the late 90s and early 2000s. The book is somewhere between a Light Novel and a YA novel, for all ages to enjoy.
About the CJ Van is a writer, game developer, and media lover. He's been a comics editor, a writer on big and small games, and worked in community management. Online, he is known for analyzing millennium-era anime as writer and host of TheDigiKnow on YouTube
As an anime-inspired story, this book may be described as a light novel, pop fiction, or a young adult (YA) novel. It can be enjoyed by young readers, as well as adults with a soft spot for monster tamer stories.
232 pages, Kindle Edition
Published December 1, 2024
14 people are currently reading
42 people want to read
About the author
CJ Van
1 bookCJ Van is a writer, game developer, and media lover.
He's been a comics editor, entertainment journalist, and has written on three video games.
His first self published novel released in 2024, after a decade of analyzing and contributing to other stories & worlds.
He's been a comics editor, entertainment journalist, and has written on three video games.
His first self published novel released in 2024, after a decade of analyzing and contributing to other stories & worlds.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
January 3, 2025
A prose love letter to Digimon and associated concepts, updating them and looking forward in ways that outdo the official handling at points.
It’s clear that the author has extensive first-hand experience with the nuances of online interactions and assorted sub-cultures of the web, as so many of the little touches ring true, as opposed to the ‘uh, the internet…and e-mail…and stuff,’ vagueness which the actual Digimon series frequently ended up employing. I especially liked the GDQ-like ‘hope donations’ comment readings in the finale, but throughout the story, the populace of the internet (including trolls) is on-point.
There are some inconsistencies with verb tenses, punctuation, and paragraph formatting, but they’re never more than minor and infrequent (and since this seems to be a self-published/self-edited work, they’re that much more forgivable). The allusions and references to properties which served as inspirations to the author are used without dwelling on them too much or being too blatant, and while the central characters are easily comparable to analogues in the inspiring properties, that doesn’t diminish the sense of who they are in this story. The emotionality so integral to the story being told is mostly expressed in simple and direct ways, but that’s in line with the youth of the characters, and it doesn’t fall into being mawkish or clumsy; it just communicates how they’re feeling, with all the strength and clarity of emotion that’s possible at that age.
The pacing is good, keeping the milestone events and connective developments flowing along, and there are enough B-plots and internal character examination to stave off a sense of barreling towards the shonen-style conclusion. It all adds up to an adventure which I imagine could easily engage even the younger readers with no pre-existing connections to or fondness for digital monsters. And, speaking personally, it did succeed at reawakening some nostalgic memories and emotions in an adult. I anticipate I’ll be turning the world of this book over in my head for a while, which, from my perspective, is high praise for a piece of literature which is unabashedly (and fittingly) utilizing a YA MO to tell its story.
It’s clear that the author has extensive first-hand experience with the nuances of online interactions and assorted sub-cultures of the web, as so many of the little touches ring true, as opposed to the ‘uh, the internet…and e-mail…and stuff,’ vagueness which the actual Digimon series frequently ended up employing. I especially liked the GDQ-like ‘hope donations’ comment readings in the finale, but throughout the story, the populace of the internet (including trolls) is on-point.
There are some inconsistencies with verb tenses, punctuation, and paragraph formatting, but they’re never more than minor and infrequent (and since this seems to be a self-published/self-edited work, they’re that much more forgivable). The allusions and references to properties which served as inspirations to the author are used without dwelling on them too much or being too blatant, and while the central characters are easily comparable to analogues in the inspiring properties, that doesn’t diminish the sense of who they are in this story. The emotionality so integral to the story being told is mostly expressed in simple and direct ways, but that’s in line with the youth of the characters, and it doesn’t fall into being mawkish or clumsy; it just communicates how they’re feeling, with all the strength and clarity of emotion that’s possible at that age.
The pacing is good, keeping the milestone events and connective developments flowing along, and there are enough B-plots and internal character examination to stave off a sense of barreling towards the shonen-style conclusion. It all adds up to an adventure which I imagine could easily engage even the younger readers with no pre-existing connections to or fondness for digital monsters. And, speaking personally, it did succeed at reawakening some nostalgic memories and emotions in an adult. I anticipate I’ll be turning the world of this book over in my head for a while, which, from my perspective, is high praise for a piece of literature which is unabashedly (and fittingly) utilizing a YA MO to tell its story.
February 25, 2025
As someone who grew up in the early 00s and was obsessed with Pokémon & Digimon, this was a real treat. The story kept the same cozy feeling that those IP’s gave me while also being very relevant to our lives today. If you grew up loving the monster-taming franchises, I would say give this one a chance. I think you will be very pleased!
February 24, 2025
I enjoyed this book immensely despite its flaws. I wished some chapters were more fleshed out and the action had bigger descriptions. I hope the author expands this to a series of books.
December 15, 2025
Dot Monster Re:volution: a $17.99 lesson in what not to do—both for a debut novel and for any attempt at a genre homage.
Crafting a tribute to a beloved franchise requires two essentials: a deep understanding of the source material and its themes, and a competent editor to refine the final product. Dot Monster Re:volution possesses neither.
Despite its premium asking price, there is zero evidence of professional editing. A thorough check of the Acknowledgments page confirms this absence, and even when reading casually I spotted several examples of text in need of work.
This single, critical failure contextualizes many, but not all, of the flaws this book puts on display.
I. Nonsensical World Building
Starting from the sample itself, the Prologue tells us that the whole internet, thanks to one cyber attack in 202X is, literally and metaphorically, melting down. We do find out who caused it in the final third of the book, but the idea of every part of the internet melting down due to a single cyber attack is already an absurd claim to swallow.
Moreover, something that causes that much damage would take a decade at least to fix, maybe a full generation depending on what was lost and the scale of the damage.
Factor in also the iCC's comically absurd monetization of services and features that Chapter 1.1 establishes, including the restriction of offline data storage, and believability in this world goes out the door.
You can't tell me that even the G7 nations wouldn't do or say anything against a single corporation controlling the internet like we're told the iCC is. Of course, the only reason the iCC is like this is because it gives a justification, albeit a weak one, to what we see the protagonists get up to as the book goes on.
II. Nonsensical Digital Creatures
Next is the DotMon themselves. From the blurb on the back of the book, 98% of i2 users have Dot Monsters. This is one of the earliest bits of evidence that this story is not a good homage to Digimon.
Digimon are meant to be creatures that only a chosen few can properly raise, much less encounter. In this story, because almost everyone has a DotMon, the protagonists are the very few who get power ups for their DotMon, and not because of the bonds they share. No, they get what are essentially plot-walled upgrades, like the Dragon Shouts in Skyrim.
This commodification of growth has a noticeable effect on the human characters' relationships with their partners. The narrative will tell you they have a deep bond, such as when their names start losing the .mon part in the second third; as the prose points out, this is what the Japanese do with honorifics when someone is a close friend or a family member, but the mechanics of the story before this point show transactional relationships, not personal ones.
More to the point, the DotMon themselves never become as unique as even the earliest Digimon from Adventure 1999. As I read through this story, this became more and more clear to me; on top of everything else, this is a noticeable failure in understanding what the heart of Digimon was.
III: Character Assassination, Or The Prose Does Agent 47's Job For Him
From the sample on offer, and throughout the book otherwise, there is a host of issues on display with the prose. The biggest one is the consistent usage of 'Tell, Don't Show' rather than the other way around.
We are told many things about Aki, Haru, Rena, Darwin, the iCC and etc., but rarely are we shown these characters or entities acting in detail, or in line with the 'tell' parts.
For instance, in Chapter 1.1, Page 13, this is how Aki is described at one point:
In this instance, the prose should detail things in the room, on her computer, around her desk, some of her thought processes, etc., to prove, or show, what we are being told. Because it does not, the reader is left to take the author at their word, and without early proof of this trait, later claims about Aki become harder to believe.
As a writer and novelist myself, here is how I would write a scene like this:
We see Aki consider, and reject, the tool, I.E. the DotMon. We are also shown that she drinks ice coffee regularly, likely to stay awake during late night coding sessions. And we get details about the source code document, that it is a work-in-progress, an iterative process several months old, leading to the current result.
Here are a few more examples of 'Tell, Don't Show' that I found throughout the book.
Chapter 1.2: "Still, Haru knew it was serious. When things needed to come together, she had a habit of stepping up."
Chapter 1.4: “She always felt that if their lives were a TV series, Haru would be the protagonist.”
Chapter 1.5: In reference to Haru being a coder, which we have not seen by this point: “You're not the only one who can do this stuff.”
Chapter 3.5: "...In the real world, Aki's little buddy became a big buddy."
Prose like this an editor could have spotted and fixed, or marked for fixing by the author.
Moving on to the protagonists as a group, their motivations and how they act as the story goes on are messy to say the least.
These are not well-built characters. They are pawns being moved around to serve the plot and the narrative.
As for the other two protagonists who come in later, we have Darwin and Jacob.
Darwin is a British kid who reaches out to Aki, Haru and Rena at the end of Chapter 1.6, asking for help. When we truly see him for the first time in Chapter 2.1, his motivations are clear: He wants to find his DotMon Finch, and rescue her if it's possible. It's a personal mission, and rooted in traditional storytelling of someone wanting to rescue a friend or loved one.
This established, Darwin's sudden moment of self-pity during the rescue mission feels unearned, arriving barely two pages after he makes his request, and several after we meet him. Unlike similar, effective arcs in the stories this book tries to homage, like Matt/Yamato's in Digimon Adventure 1999, there is no emotional foundation to make the reader feel the weight of his guilt.
Lastly, we have the only two iCC people who are given names: Bridger, the 'sweaty man' from the Prologue, and Ray, the iCC Director. The most I can and will say about these two is they're cartoon villains, and we see nothing to dissuade that belief, even into the final third of the book.
Section IV: The Lack Of Stakes And The Speedrunning Plot
If you've ever wanted to know what it looks like when a story is in speedrunning mode, Dot Monsters will give you a textbook example. It took about two hours for me to finish this book, yet exponentially more to read it again and document everything I found wrong about it.
For most plot beats, after they're introduced, they'll be resolved within 15 pages. Here are a few examples.
Opening & Sealing The First Crack: ~11 pages (Introduced: Pg. 21, Resolved: Pg. 32)
With just 226 pages to this book's name, how fast these plots come and go means there's no time for any of them to stick and affect the story.
Moreover, the number of plot beats that I recognized from previous Digimon seasons, such as the first Four Darknessess, which are essentially The Dark Masters from Digimon Adventure 1999, left the story itself feeling even more hollow.
And on that point, as a capstone to this and the three previous sections, I have to say something about Aki, the main character.
She is a Mary Sue, in every sense of the word. A quintessential example of a character insulated from the consequences of her actions.
When the plot isn't protecting her, like it did with Mamoru.mon suddenly appearing and dealing with the first monsters, it is allowing the plans she comes up with and acts upon with the others, including ones that are dangerously reckless, to be agreed upon with very little resistance. She also faces no permanent, serious consequences for her actions, at any time.
Even before I reached that point in this story, it was clear to me that this particular story was un-salvageable. That it's a cyberpunk-lite power-fantasy that prioritizes a specific narrative, and some questionable themes, over coherent storytelling.
Section V: What Could Have Been
But the absolute worst part? There was a compelling framework for a good story in here, and it was easily within reach, but we didn't get it.
Imagine, for a moment, if the conflict of this setting and world had been structured like this:
The iCC puts up i2 as originally done, not just because the cyber attack was that devastating, but because they knew, thanks to several Dot Monsters directly telling them, that there was something worse out there and i2 would hold it back.
“There is evil in our world that wants into yours. Use this to hold it back, and be vigilant. It never sleeps, nor should you.”
“Wait, what exactly is 'it'?”
“'It' is a name I hope you never have to utter. In your language, nor any other.”
And it does work, for a few years, until it becomes clear that this evil knows there's a barrier in place, and is trying to pierce it. This would, assuming the iCC is smart and doesn't want to cause a world wide panic, force them to put up Firewalls to cover the cracks that get opened in the i2 barrier. These Firewalls cause communication blackouts, and without serious help, they're left to patch the cracks, slowly but eventually.
Enter the DotSavers, a collection of kids and adults with DotMon. They've been affected by the Firewalls too, but they have the monsters that can help fix the problem because they either passed through the First Internet into i2 for safety, or they were near a crack when it opened and were awakened to what was going on, and their numbers are growing by the year.
They coordinate attacks, they train and support each other, and they're taking the fight to the big bad, on their home turf as well as, eventually, its backyard.
But, in order for them to fix problems at the source, they sometimes have to go after the Firewalls the iCC put up, to reach and patch the cracks that have opened, or pass through them to deal with a localized issue on the other side.
That is a story I would not only read several times over, but likely consider as good as some books I still remember from middle school.
There was something here, but given what we got, and for what we're asked to spend, this should be a hard pass.
One more thing: I seriously hope the author considers getting an editor for the sequel this book has already shown. That sequel snippet at the end has many of the same problems I noticed in this story.
Crafting a tribute to a beloved franchise requires two essentials: a deep understanding of the source material and its themes, and a competent editor to refine the final product. Dot Monster Re:volution possesses neither.
Despite its premium asking price, there is zero evidence of professional editing. A thorough check of the Acknowledgments page confirms this absence, and even when reading casually I spotted several examples of text in need of work.
This single, critical failure contextualizes many, but not all, of the flaws this book puts on display.
I. Nonsensical World Building
Starting from the sample itself, the Prologue tells us that the whole internet, thanks to one cyber attack in 202X is, literally and metaphorically, melting down. We do find out who caused it in the final third of the book, but the idea of every part of the internet melting down due to a single cyber attack is already an absurd claim to swallow.
Moreover, something that causes that much damage would take a decade at least to fix, maybe a full generation depending on what was lost and the scale of the damage.
Factor in also the iCC's comically absurd monetization of services and features that Chapter 1.1 establishes, including the restriction of offline data storage, and believability in this world goes out the door.
You can't tell me that even the G7 nations wouldn't do or say anything against a single corporation controlling the internet like we're told the iCC is. Of course, the only reason the iCC is like this is because it gives a justification, albeit a weak one, to what we see the protagonists get up to as the book goes on.
II. Nonsensical Digital Creatures
Next is the DotMon themselves. From the blurb on the back of the book, 98% of i2 users have Dot Monsters. This is one of the earliest bits of evidence that this story is not a good homage to Digimon.
Digimon are meant to be creatures that only a chosen few can properly raise, much less encounter. In this story, because almost everyone has a DotMon, the protagonists are the very few who get power ups for their DotMon, and not because of the bonds they share. No, they get what are essentially plot-walled upgrades, like the Dragon Shouts in Skyrim.
This commodification of growth has a noticeable effect on the human characters' relationships with their partners. The narrative will tell you they have a deep bond, such as when their names start losing the .mon part in the second third; as the prose points out, this is what the Japanese do with honorifics when someone is a close friend or a family member, but the mechanics of the story before this point show transactional relationships, not personal ones.
More to the point, the DotMon themselves never become as unique as even the earliest Digimon from Adventure 1999. As I read through this story, this became more and more clear to me; on top of everything else, this is a noticeable failure in understanding what the heart of Digimon was.
III: Character Assassination, Or The Prose Does Agent 47's Job For Him
From the sample on offer, and throughout the book otherwise, there is a host of issues on display with the prose. The biggest one is the consistent usage of 'Tell, Don't Show' rather than the other way around.
We are told many things about Aki, Haru, Rena, Darwin, the iCC and etc., but rarely are we shown these characters or entities acting in detail, or in line with the 'tell' parts.
For instance, in Chapter 1.1, Page 13, this is how Aki is described at one point:
"Even though most programmers today embraced the assistance of the DotMon, Aki had a stubborn obsession with being like the coders of yesterday. She wanted to be self-sufficient like them -- relying on nothing but their minds, their keyboard, and iced coffee."
In this instance, the prose should detail things in the room, on her computer, around her desk, some of her thought processes, etc., to prove, or show, what we are being told. Because it does not, the reader is left to take the author at their word, and without early proof of this trait, later claims about Aki become harder to believe.
As a writer and novelist myself, here is how I would write a scene like this:
"For a moment, Aki let herself imagine a DotMon in the corner of her screen, ready and willing to help however it could. A quick sigh, and a shake of her head, threw the idea away. The source code text document behind her i2 view was over a thousand lines long, the culmination of two weeks of sitting at her desk tapping keys for many hours each day; one empty iced coffee can rested behind her monitor, a small reminder of how many she’d drank since starting this transfer tunnel upgrade project, and since building her first transfer tunnel in general back in January."
We see Aki consider, and reject, the tool, I.E. the DotMon. We are also shown that she drinks ice coffee regularly, likely to stay awake during late night coding sessions. And we get details about the source code document, that it is a work-in-progress, an iterative process several months old, leading to the current result.
Here are a few more examples of 'Tell, Don't Show' that I found throughout the book.
Chapter 1.2: "Still, Haru knew it was serious. When things needed to come together, she had a habit of stepping up."
Chapter 1.4: “She always felt that if their lives were a TV series, Haru would be the protagonist.”
Chapter 1.5: In reference to Haru being a coder, which we have not seen by this point: “You're not the only one who can do this stuff.”
Chapter 3.5: "...In the real world, Aki's little buddy became a big buddy."
Prose like this an editor could have spotted and fixed, or marked for fixing by the author.
Moving on to the protagonists as a group, their motivations and how they act as the story goes on are messy to say the least.
These are not well-built characters. They are pawns being moved around to serve the plot and the narrative.
As for the other two protagonists who come in later, we have Darwin and Jacob.
Darwin is a British kid who reaches out to Aki, Haru and Rena at the end of Chapter 1.6, asking for help. When we truly see him for the first time in Chapter 2.1, his motivations are clear: He wants to find his DotMon Finch, and rescue her if it's possible. It's a personal mission, and rooted in traditional storytelling of someone wanting to rescue a friend or loved one.
This established, Darwin's sudden moment of self-pity during the rescue mission feels unearned, arriving barely two pages after he makes his request, and several after we meet him. Unlike similar, effective arcs in the stories this book tries to homage, like Matt/Yamato's in Digimon Adventure 1999, there is no emotional foundation to make the reader feel the weight of his guilt.
Lastly, we have the only two iCC people who are given names: Bridger, the 'sweaty man' from the Prologue, and Ray, the iCC Director. The most I can and will say about these two is they're cartoon villains, and we see nothing to dissuade that belief, even into the final third of the book.
Section IV: The Lack Of Stakes And The Speedrunning Plot
If you've ever wanted to know what it looks like when a story is in speedrunning mode, Dot Monsters will give you a textbook example. It took about two hours for me to finish this book, yet exponentially more to read it again and document everything I found wrong about it.
For most plot beats, after they're introduced, they'll be resolved within 15 pages. Here are a few examples.
Opening & Sealing The First Crack: ~11 pages (Introduced: Pg. 21, Resolved: Pg. 32)
With just 226 pages to this book's name, how fast these plots come and go means there's no time for any of them to stick and affect the story.
Moreover, the number of plot beats that I recognized from previous Digimon seasons, such as the first Four Darknessess, which are essentially The Dark Masters from Digimon Adventure 1999, left the story itself feeling even more hollow.
And on that point, as a capstone to this and the three previous sections, I have to say something about Aki, the main character.
She is a Mary Sue, in every sense of the word. A quintessential example of a character insulated from the consequences of her actions.
When the plot isn't protecting her, like it did with Mamoru.mon suddenly appearing and dealing with the first monsters, it is allowing the plans she comes up with and acts upon with the others, including ones that are dangerously reckless, to be agreed upon with very little resistance. She also faces no permanent, serious consequences for her actions, at any time.
Even before I reached that point in this story, it was clear to me that this particular story was un-salvageable. That it's a cyberpunk-lite power-fantasy that prioritizes a specific narrative, and some questionable themes, over coherent storytelling.
Section V: What Could Have Been
But the absolute worst part? There was a compelling framework for a good story in here, and it was easily within reach, but we didn't get it.
Imagine, for a moment, if the conflict of this setting and world had been structured like this:
The iCC puts up i2 as originally done, not just because the cyber attack was that devastating, but because they knew, thanks to several Dot Monsters directly telling them, that there was something worse out there and i2 would hold it back.
“There is evil in our world that wants into yours. Use this to hold it back, and be vigilant. It never sleeps, nor should you.”
“Wait, what exactly is 'it'?”
“'It' is a name I hope you never have to utter. In your language, nor any other.”
And it does work, for a few years, until it becomes clear that this evil knows there's a barrier in place, and is trying to pierce it. This would, assuming the iCC is smart and doesn't want to cause a world wide panic, force them to put up Firewalls to cover the cracks that get opened in the i2 barrier. These Firewalls cause communication blackouts, and without serious help, they're left to patch the cracks, slowly but eventually.
Enter the DotSavers, a collection of kids and adults with DotMon. They've been affected by the Firewalls too, but they have the monsters that can help fix the problem because they either passed through the First Internet into i2 for safety, or they were near a crack when it opened and were awakened to what was going on, and their numbers are growing by the year.
They coordinate attacks, they train and support each other, and they're taking the fight to the big bad, on their home turf as well as, eventually, its backyard.
But, in order for them to fix problems at the source, they sometimes have to go after the Firewalls the iCC put up, to reach and patch the cracks that have opened, or pass through them to deal with a localized issue on the other side.
That is a story I would not only read several times over, but likely consider as good as some books I still remember from middle school.
There was something here, but given what we got, and for what we're asked to spend, this should be a hard pass.
One more thing: I seriously hope the author considers getting an editor for the sequel this book has already shown. That sequel snippet at the end has many of the same problems I noticed in this story.
September 29, 2025
Dot Monster was a book I read faster than I expected. Maybe it’s the Digimon fan in me diving in, and an appreciation for another fan’s inspired work. CJ Van, the author, has a love for Digimon and the internet that is so palpable. It goes beyond just “hey, this is what online communities can be like.”
There’s a scene in the mid-to-end where a character gives a speech about identity. As part of it, they talk about the value of online friends. That, just because someone doesn’t share the same space as you, doesn’t make your relationship with them any less real.
As someone who’s first real experience with friendship was through xbox live, that speech resonated strongly. I think it’s really important that artists depict this kind of message. We live in a period where it’s never been easier to find social groups dedicated to the most niche media, or most unique of experiences. It’s crucial that we teach new generations that the overlap of genuineness between “online” and “real” friends is a circle.
In that same speech, CJ Van commentates on imposter syndrome too. I thought that was done very well and is yet another important message. For both new generations and old. I also appreciated that, while CJ Van showed how beautiful the internet can be, he didn’t shy away from how nasty it can be too. Harassment, people trying to exploit others, these are very real threats. But like humanity as a whole, the internet should not be shunned or disregarded just from the actions of a few.
I will say, Dot Monster does have the roughness of a writer’s first book. Namely that some parts have too much fluff text, definitely a bit of “telling” instead of “showing.” Whereas other parts don’t have enough description behind them. I felt in particular that the final battle didn’t have enough of a body. One egregious example is one of the members of the team never gets a physical description. You’ll never know what he looks like at all.
I ended up not super attached to the characters if I’m honest. I think the appeal of something like Digimon is having a bunch of little moments with the characters. Ones that don’t necessarily ‘add to the plot.’ These scenes, which some may call “filler”, are important building blocks for relationships between your characters. Dot Monster doesn’t really have these kind of moments. I wouldn’t have minded the story being a bit longer if it meant we could have moments like that.
But in the end, I very much enjoyed Dot Monster. If you’re a fan of Digimon I’d definitely recommend it. If CJ Van made another story in this setting I’d grab it. I’d like to see maybe a lower-stakes story involving Dot Monsters. Something more personal.
I’d also recommend his YouTube channel, TheDigiKnow. He makes great videos on the various Digimon series.
There’s a scene in the mid-to-end where a character gives a speech about identity. As part of it, they talk about the value of online friends. That, just because someone doesn’t share the same space as you, doesn’t make your relationship with them any less real.
As someone who’s first real experience with friendship was through xbox live, that speech resonated strongly. I think it’s really important that artists depict this kind of message. We live in a period where it’s never been easier to find social groups dedicated to the most niche media, or most unique of experiences. It’s crucial that we teach new generations that the overlap of genuineness between “online” and “real” friends is a circle.
In that same speech, CJ Van commentates on imposter syndrome too. I thought that was done very well and is yet another important message. For both new generations and old. I also appreciated that, while CJ Van showed how beautiful the internet can be, he didn’t shy away from how nasty it can be too. Harassment, people trying to exploit others, these are very real threats. But like humanity as a whole, the internet should not be shunned or disregarded just from the actions of a few.
I will say, Dot Monster does have the roughness of a writer’s first book. Namely that some parts have too much fluff text, definitely a bit of “telling” instead of “showing.” Whereas other parts don’t have enough description behind them. I felt in particular that the final battle didn’t have enough of a body. One egregious example is one of the members of the team never gets a physical description. You’ll never know what he looks like at all.
I ended up not super attached to the characters if I’m honest. I think the appeal of something like Digimon is having a bunch of little moments with the characters. Ones that don’t necessarily ‘add to the plot.’ These scenes, which some may call “filler”, are important building blocks for relationships between your characters. Dot Monster doesn’t really have these kind of moments. I wouldn’t have minded the story being a bit longer if it meant we could have moments like that.
But in the end, I very much enjoyed Dot Monster. If you’re a fan of Digimon I’d definitely recommend it. If CJ Van made another story in this setting I’d grab it. I’d like to see maybe a lower-stakes story involving Dot Monsters. Something more personal.
I’d also recommend his YouTube channel, TheDigiKnow. He makes great videos on the various Digimon series.
May 13, 2025
What a time! Usually a three star book either leaves me disappointed or feeling ambivalent but this was wonderful.
It’s very obviously a first novel. There’s lot of refinement and editing that is needed. The diction can be clunky, the pacing strange, often childish characterization, and if you’ve watched digimon at all, you’ll recognize many of the story beats. So there was no way I could give this book more than a 3.
But if you’re a fan of monster anime, specifically Digimon, if you used to spend your time as a kid wishing you could have a monster partner, if you fantasized about 90s internet , then I highly recommend this book. So much heart and I can tell Van has such a love for the monster taming genre, it’s wonderful. And I appreciate seeing a story that doesn’t demonized the internet but instead shows it as liberating, wondrous (and messy) space.
It’s very obviously a first novel. There’s lot of refinement and editing that is needed. The diction can be clunky, the pacing strange, often childish characterization, and if you’ve watched digimon at all, you’ll recognize many of the story beats. So there was no way I could give this book more than a 3.
But if you’re a fan of monster anime, specifically Digimon, if you used to spend your time as a kid wishing you could have a monster partner, if you fantasized about 90s internet , then I highly recommend this book. So much heart and I can tell Van has such a love for the monster taming genre, it’s wonderful. And I appreciate seeing a story that doesn’t demonized the internet but instead shows it as liberating, wondrous (and messy) space.
May 4, 2025
It read like a season of the show it’s clearly inspired from and that’s all you can really ask. This is a fans 4 star and not an unbiased 4 stars.
May 28, 2025
So fun! A quick read that brought me back to being a kid. Tamagotchi in hand logging into my parents computer after school
December 28, 2025
I grew up watching and playing anything having to do with virtual worlds and virtual creatures. The late 90's and early 00's had a plethora of these stories and I ate them up. I've recently started revisiting some of those shows and discovered sites and channels that celebrate them.
One of those channels belonged to this book's author, who posted a link to a preview of a book he'd written. While I was skeptical, I gave the preview a try, and soon lost myself in it. When the end came and I wanted to read more right then, I knew that I needed the entire thing.
The world in the book is an interesting one. The internet has been attacked by a virus and sealed off to prevent the spread. The i2 is created with a more restricted service with several features now locked behind pay walls. Personal freedom and responsibility vs. controlled safety in a bubble is a major issue in the book. Dotmons are the individual AI security/app/personal assistants to the i2 users helping to navigate their daily virtual lives. It's not long before Dotmon are discovered to be more than just helpers and a bigger story unfolds.
One of the things I enjoyed the most was how each character reacts to the discovery of the "old" internet. Being able to get around the locked areas to converse with family, or using the anonymity to become a modern influencer or seeking out buried info. It brings a realness to a fantasy book that keeps the suspension of disbelief alive. The world itself is also well done. Telling the reader how things work now without being an info dump was good. I could easily read a sequel or short stories just featuring the characters exploring or going shopping in it.
In conclusion, I recommend it to anyone who grew up during the digital pets/worlds boom or anyone who stayed up staring at a screen and surfing through newly connected worlds to find others like themselves. This was a great debut, and I hope to read more!
One of those channels belonged to this book's author, who posted a link to a preview of a book he'd written. While I was skeptical, I gave the preview a try, and soon lost myself in it. When the end came and I wanted to read more right then, I knew that I needed the entire thing.
The world in the book is an interesting one. The internet has been attacked by a virus and sealed off to prevent the spread. The i2 is created with a more restricted service with several features now locked behind pay walls. Personal freedom and responsibility vs. controlled safety in a bubble is a major issue in the book. Dotmons are the individual AI security/app/personal assistants to the i2 users helping to navigate their daily virtual lives. It's not long before Dotmon are discovered to be more than just helpers and a bigger story unfolds.
One of the things I enjoyed the most was how each character reacts to the discovery of the "old" internet. Being able to get around the locked areas to converse with family, or using the anonymity to become a modern influencer or seeking out buried info. It brings a realness to a fantasy book that keeps the suspension of disbelief alive. The world itself is also well done. Telling the reader how things work now without being an info dump was good. I could easily read a sequel or short stories just featuring the characters exploring or going shopping in it.
In conclusion, I recommend it to anyone who grew up during the digital pets/worlds boom or anyone who stayed up staring at a screen and surfing through newly connected worlds to find others like themselves. This was a great debut, and I hope to read more!
February 9, 2025
I've been a big fan of the monster taming genre since I could talk, but Digimon has always had a special place for me. These monsters were people in their own right and on equal footing with their human companions. They were real partners who were there for their humans during hardships, from fantastical & supernatural like being attacked by monsters in another world, to real, painfully relatable hardships like illness or the breaking up of a family. It was truly special. CJ Van has a real love for the material that inspired this project and it shows.
Dot Monster Re:Volution captures so much of what made Digimon special, impressively using nostalgia without relying on it to carry the story. Its themes, dealing directly with the fight for a free and open internet, and how the corruption and greed of corporate/government systems seeks to rip that freedom away on and offline, are perhaps more and more relevant with each passing day.
And that is probably my favorite aspect of this novel. CJ Van has managed to capture the absolute elation of the "I have a super cool monster as a best bud who can transform into bigger and better forms" and still maintained the depth beneath that concept, while expanding on it in a completely new and fresh way. He manages to capture so many aspects of childhood, growing up glued to the online world, and how many things we have given up on because of corrupt systems; things that many kids growing up with internet don't even realize they've lost.
If you have any love for Digimon, monster taming, or the joy and community of an online (and offline) world, then please pick up Dotmon.
sEE yOU oNLINE.
Dot Monster Re:Volution captures so much of what made Digimon special, impressively using nostalgia without relying on it to carry the story. Its themes, dealing directly with the fight for a free and open internet, and how the corruption and greed of corporate/government systems seeks to rip that freedom away on and offline, are perhaps more and more relevant with each passing day.
And that is probably my favorite aspect of this novel. CJ Van has managed to capture the absolute elation of the "I have a super cool monster as a best bud who can transform into bigger and better forms" and still maintained the depth beneath that concept, while expanding on it in a completely new and fresh way. He manages to capture so many aspects of childhood, growing up glued to the online world, and how many things we have given up on because of corrupt systems; things that many kids growing up with internet don't even realize they've lost.
If you have any love for Digimon, monster taming, or the joy and community of an online (and offline) world, then please pick up Dotmon.
sEE yOU oNLINE.
April 9, 2025
I absolutely loved the world that C.J. Van has created with Dot Monster ReVolution.
While seeming completely familiar and nostalgic, an homage to the worlds a lot of us grew up adoring: Digimon, Beyblade, Pokémon, Yu-Gi-Oh! - While also feeling completely new. I loved the i2, the use of servers and tech being close to what we have now, yet still futuristic! (Add Hosoda movies to that list of nostalgia!)
Every new character or DotMon introduced was exciting and I could feel the excitement of my inner child wanting to see the characters on screen or in a game or something!
I hope to see more of this world, more from the DotSavers, and I wish the author every success in the future!
C.J. (TheDigiKnow) - Thank you so much for making this!!
While seeming completely familiar and nostalgic, an homage to the worlds a lot of us grew up adoring: Digimon, Beyblade, Pokémon, Yu-Gi-Oh! - While also feeling completely new. I loved the i2, the use of servers and tech being close to what we have now, yet still futuristic! (Add Hosoda movies to that list of nostalgia!)
Every new character or DotMon introduced was exciting and I could feel the excitement of my inner child wanting to see the characters on screen or in a game or something!
I hope to see more of this world, more from the DotSavers, and I wish the author every success in the future!
C.J. (TheDigiKnow) - Thank you so much for making this!!
November 29, 2025
An easy and fun read! Perfect fit for any fans of the author’s YouTube content and late 90s early 2000’s anime. It was the right tinge of action, adventure and sweet sentiments. Although definitely the work of a fan, it felt elevated beyond being purely fanfiction. Definitely recommend for adult fans of works like Digimon, but also for younger readers! Human connection is important for all ages.
December 28, 2025
Dot Monster ReVolution might be a novel, but it feels more like watching a season of anime. It has that nostalgic Fox Kids energy, with strong Digimon, Pokémon, and Medabots vibes, without being too bogged down in references. The story moves fast, with near-constant set pieces that drop you into familiar shonen style situations (including a classic tournament arc) while still putting its own spin on them. The pacing can feel lightning fast, but it works because the rules of the world are established early and clearly, making the lore feel both familiar and genuinely intriguing.
What might be my favourite part is how well the story handles modern internet culture. It thankfully doesn’t fall into the boring “unplug and touch grass” cliche. Instead, it embraces the real connections people form online, while also exploring the tension between your online persona and your real-world self. That balance feels current without being preachy and perfectly fits the world here.
As a Toronto reader, I got the same feeling reading this that I did when I first read Scott Pilgrim. Following Aki as a Toronto-based protagonist with close ties to Japan gives the story a fun multicultural perspective that I’m sure many readers will see parts of themselves in. While the characters lean into recognizable anime archetypes, they’re grounded by relatable insecurities, motivations, and flaws that make them feel genuinely human.
Overall, the Dot Monster ReVolution feels like a best-of remix of Persona, Digimon, Summer Wars, and even a bit of Scott Pilgrim energy, filtered into its own cool thing. By the end, I was fully invested in the world and the characters, and can’t wait to see where the adventure goes next.
What might be my favourite part is how well the story handles modern internet culture. It thankfully doesn’t fall into the boring “unplug and touch grass” cliche. Instead, it embraces the real connections people form online, while also exploring the tension between your online persona and your real-world self. That balance feels current without being preachy and perfectly fits the world here.
As a Toronto reader, I got the same feeling reading this that I did when I first read Scott Pilgrim. Following Aki as a Toronto-based protagonist with close ties to Japan gives the story a fun multicultural perspective that I’m sure many readers will see parts of themselves in. While the characters lean into recognizable anime archetypes, they’re grounded by relatable insecurities, motivations, and flaws that make them feel genuinely human.
Overall, the Dot Monster ReVolution feels like a best-of remix of Persona, Digimon, Summer Wars, and even a bit of Scott Pilgrim energy, filtered into its own cool thing. By the end, I was fully invested in the world and the characters, and can’t wait to see where the adventure goes next.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews