reubenalbatross 's review for:

Make Me Famous by Maud Ventura
5.0
challenging dark fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
(Review made against an uncorrected proof) 

A quote on the first page of this book encapsulates the story perfectly – 

"Fame is a war trophy, and no one is ever ready to give it up." 

At first, I was a little put off by it, as right from the off it includes real celebrity names in the story. I was worried it would start putting words in these real people’s mouths, which makes me extremely uncomfortable. However, they were only ever used for our main character to compare herself to, so the inclusion of real people made sense, as it gave us full context for the comparisons she was making. 

It brought me to tears 70 pages in, which I was not expecting to happen. Literally turned a page, read a few lines, and I was in bits. Really powerful writing. 

And on that note, I really enjoyed the writing style of this. It was fast paced, gripping, and the inclusion of social media felt completely natural (which is a gripe I have with a lot of new-ish books), and definitely had the readability of authors like Taylor Jenkins Reid. It also had a really unique voice, which has definitely made me want to read The Husbands. 

While it had the readability and focus on celebrity of Reid’s work, it definitely approached the subject in a different way. I’d say Reid’s books are on the celebrity tabloid/gossip side of things, including scandalous details to ‘delight and shock’ the reader. Ventura, on the other hand, presented everything in a much more disparaging light, showing the true cost of fame in acute detail. It was very uncomfortable to read at times, but every page was worth it. 

I also thought the way Ventura included the running mystery of what happened for Cleo to want to escape her life was really well done. It was hinted at throughout the book, but nothing was relying on the answer to the mystery. The story completely holds up without knowledge of that event, so the mystery is more an extra sprinkle of intrigue, rather than a main focal point. This also meant that it didn’t feel like she was holding the answer over my head towards the end of the book as an incentive to continue reading, which is a method I’ve experienced many authors using, and annoys me every time. 

The only thing that rubbed me the wrong way in this was the lack of focus on Cleo giving live performances. The first mention of a concert is on page 166, with the context that she’d already been giving live performances for ages. This felt pretty off, as we focused so much on her song writing/producing and her being in the recording studio, yet one of the biggest public parts of a musician’s career is performing, so why was this skimmed over so much?  

And then when live performances are finally mentioned, it appears that right from the beginning she’s always been great at it. I just don’t believe that. Even if she’d deluded herself so much that she would be great live, the adrenaline alone walking on stage in front of that many people would fuck her up the first few times, or at least mean she had to work on getting used to it. Everything else she is good at we see her work from the bottom up to get there, but with live performance we don’t. It would have been really interesting to see ow she dealt with the adjustment between dinging her songs in the studio to playing live in front of thousands, but I guess it wasn’t to be. 

Having said that, the concert point didn’t affect my read too much, and who knows, maybe she didn’t mention live performances until she was an established musician because the first ones she gave were shit and she didn’t want to let us know. She is a truly highly delusional character (obviously covering for a serious amount of self-loathing and self-doubt), so I wouldn’t put it past her. 

The ending of the book was the cherry on top of a great read. Like so many things in this book, it skirted the edges of the absurd, but for me Ventura got away with so much in this story that coming from other authors would seem completely ridiculous. She made a real impact with every single word on the page, and I was left gasping at that brilliant ending. 

I also have to give Ventura buckets of credit for writing such an unlikeable main character who was entertaining enough for me to 1. Finish the book 2. Enjoy every word I read. So many authors miss the mark with this and I have to give up on so many books because of it, but Ventura didn’t let me down. 

To close, two quotes summing up Ventura’s take on the industrial music machine: 

“…it took me ten years to become an overnight success.” 

“You’re an object.”