Chap­ter 28 of We Solve Mur­ders fol­lows the evo­lu­tion of Bon­nie Gre­gor, an influ­encer who start­ed her jour­ney with hum­ble begin­nings. What began as a sim­ple Insta­gram post of a pink toi­let door quick­ly grew into a social media sen­sa­tion. With­in just a year, Bonnie’s fol­low­er count had surged to 14,000, a stark con­trast to the mod­est start of shar­ing images with fam­i­ly and friends. A seem­ing­ly insignif­i­cant post caught the atten­tion of the mass­es, with even Fearne Cotton’s moth­er shar­ing it, cat­a­pult­ing Bon­nie to influ­encer sta­tus. This chap­ter reveals the sur­pris­ing speed at which social media fame can be achieved, even from the most unex­pect­ed begin­nings.

Reflect­ing on her rise to fame, Bon­nie scrolls through her Insta­gram and remem­bers the ear­ly days when her #LooWith­AView post ini­tial­ly only gar­nered four likes, with most com­ing from sup­port­ive friends or a per­sis­tent bot from South Korea. She recalls her ini­tial attempts at social media fame, includ­ing a brief and unsuc­cess­ful attempt at a pic­ture of Har­ry Styles, which she dis­card­ed as dis­re­spect­ful. Bon­nie cred­its her friend Reba for encour­ag­ing her to see the poten­tial in her grow­ing audi­ence, with 14,000 fol­low­ers offi­cial­ly clas­si­fy­ing her as an influ­encer. This new­found label push­es Bon­nie to seri­ous­ly con­sid­er the pos­si­bil­i­ty of turn­ing her social media pres­ence into a viable career path. Her self-reflec­tion on this tran­si­tion high­lights the ease with which some­one can go from casu­al shar­ing to a more pur­pose­ful career in the dig­i­tal world.

Despite expe­ri­enc­ing some setbacks—such as her fol­low­er count dip­ping after the ini­tial buzz from the toi­let door post—Bonnie quick­ly adapt­ed. She cre­ative­ly paint­ed “ILove­MyK­itchen” on her cab­i­net, which sparked a renewed inter­est in her con­tent. This cre­ative effort led her to turn her home into a space for her dig­i­tal activism, dec­o­rat­ing her walls with var­i­ous slo­gans. Although she quick­ly real­ized she had run out of wall space to dec­o­rate, this phase in her jour­ney shows how influ­encers often use their envi­ron­ment as a can­vas for self-expres­sion. Bonnie’s abil­i­ty to adapt and think out­side the box, despite fac­ing chal­lenges, is an impor­tant ele­ment of the influ­encer world, where stay­ing rel­e­vant and engag­ing is key to growth.

Arriv­ing in Letch­worth Gar­den City, Bon­nie feels a blend of ner­vous­ness and excite­ment as she pre­pares for an impor­tant meet­ing with Felic­i­ty Wool­las­ton of Vivid Viral Media. Before the meet­ing, she takes a moment to immerse her­self in the pic­turesque sur­round­ings, snap­ping pho­tos of her mar­ket­ing efforts along the way. She takes the oppor­tu­ni­ty to place a stick­er on a bench, cap­tur­ing the moment with a pho­to and shar­ing it on Insta­gram, eager for the instant val­i­da­tion of likes and com­ments. The quick surge in engage­ment boosts her con­fi­dence and rein­forces her belief in the pow­er of social media to bring pos­i­tiv­i­ty to a world that can some­times seem filled with neg­a­tiv­i­ty. Bonnie’s under­stand­ing of social media’s impact on per­son­al brand­ing is clear as she con­tin­ues to build her pres­ence with each post.

As Bon­nie walks toward her meet­ing with Felic­i­ty, she reflects on her aspi­ra­tions for the future. Despite her grow­ing social media suc­cess, Bon­nie feels that her cur­rent projects bare­ly cov­er her expens­es, and her day job is still essen­tial to sup­port her. How­ev­er, with a wealth of cre­ative ideas in mind, she is hope­ful that Felic­i­ty can help her mon­e­tize her pas­sions and trans­form her dig­i­tal pres­ence into a full-time career. Bonnie’s desire to learn from Felic­i­ty about the strate­gies that can turn her dreams into real­i­ty speaks to the com­mon jour­ney of many influ­encers striv­ing to make the leap from hob­by­ists to pro­fes­sion­als. Her under­stand­ing that suc­cess requires both big dreams and the right guid­ance is a cru­cial les­son for any­one nav­i­gat­ing the com­plex­i­ties of turn­ing a pas­sion into a career.