Cyber Whispers — More than A Fake News Ghost Story

Misinformation. Manipulation. And the things we choose not to see.

In a few weeks, Cyber Whispers — A Fake News Ghost Story will go live.

Most readers will pick it up expecting a tense, twist-filled adventure about disinformation, social-media manipulation, and the frightening ease with which lies spread. And yes — all of that is there. The ghost story is a metaphor for viral misinformation: invisible, contagious, whispering through the cracks of screens and minds. Readers will learn to question sources, recognise bias, and see algorithms not as truth-delivery machines but as profit-driven storytellers.

But Cyber Whispers carries another thread, woven quietly through the pages, a thread about how we treat the non-human world.

In Cyber Whispers, that takes shape through horses. Their fear, their exploitation, their silence in a world made loud by human ambition. But the deeper point is not only about horses. It could just as easily have been factory-farmed cattle, battery chickens, or the billions of unseen creatures that live and die inside industrial food systems. It’s about who suffers when humans value winning, status or convenience over compassion.

Because stories can do two things at once.
They can entertain. And they can unsettle us into noticing.

Why horses? 

Anyone who followed recent discussion in equestrian circles,  injuries, welfare concerns, the ethics of training, scandal after scandal,  knows the sport is experiencing a reckoning. Images circulating online have shown horses pushed to breaking point, bred for medals rather than well-being, trained through fear, isolation, coercion. A world calling itself elegant and noble suddenly revealed in bruises, scars and blue tongues.

The heart of the conflict is ancient and simple: Do we value the horse as a partner or as a tool?

In Cyber Whispers, that tension lives inside the storyworld. It’s never preached. It’s felt. Readers see companionship, trust, and intelligence,  but also the quiet cost of human expectation. They face the uncomfortable truth that an animal’s silence is not consent. That pain can be invisible. That tradition is not the same as ethics. And this matters because the next generation will inherit the choice.

When fiction becomes a doorway, not just a mirror

This isn't the first time I’ve tucked a side-theme inside a story.

In Cyber Secrets, A Digital Citizenship Adventure Story, global connection and cultural curiosity became part of the narrative,  and real schools wrote to one another because of it. Reading sparked real-world bridges. That’s the magic of edufiction: a story does not end on the final page. It encourages conversation, empathy, and questions that last long after the book is closed.

Cyber Whispers aims for the same ripple.

If even one classroom debates animal ethics…
If one reader questions how food arrives on their plate…
If one young person recognises that truth is fragile,  and worth fighting for…

Then the story has done more than entertain.
It has opened a doorway to awareness.

What readers will walk away with

• Media Literacy Skills -  Understanding misinformation, viral fear, and how online narratives shape belief.

• Critical Thinking -  Learning to pause before sharing, to fact-check, to resist the ghost-like lure of the sensational.

• Compassion Beyond the Screen - Recognising non-human suffering,  whether in horse arenas, feedlots, or factory farms,  and asking the ancient ethical question: Just because we can, should we?

• Global Awareness & Connection - Encouraging schools and young people to look outward, to learn across cultures, to see the world (and its creatures) not as background but as community.

In the end, Cyber Whispers is a ghost story.

But not all ghosts are dead things.
Some are truths we ignore.
Some are animals we silence.
Some are voices drowned beneath the noise of likes, followers, medals, and money.
Stories help us hear them.

Cyber Whispers — A Fake News Ghost Story launches soon.

The buttons below provide extra learning resources based on this blog post. If you’re an educator, librarian, homeschool parent, or simply a reader who believes stories can grow empathy,  this one is for you. Let’s teach young people to question what they’re told. Let’s also teach them to care for those who cannot speak.