It's All Your Fault

October 26, 2015
Heller Harrigan, a troubled teen star made famous in a Hannah Montana-like TV show, is about to make her big-screen debut in a film based on a YA novel, one that sounds like an angel-themed mashup of Twilight and The Hunger Games. Her homeschooled cousin Catey, a 17-year-old naïf in kneesocks, is reluctantly drafted to play chaperone to ensure that just-out-of-rehab Heller gets to the red carpet premiere drug- and scandal-free. Catey, whose family performs as “The Singing Singleberries,” is devoutly Christian and anxiety-ridden, making it a very long 72 hours for both girls, especially since they haven’t spoken since a mysterious falling out years earlier. Improbable hilarity abounds—the girls get in legal trouble, but buy off the judge with tickets to the Angel Wars premiere for his granddaughters Katniss, Hermione, and Bella—as Rudnick skewers celebrity, Brooklyn hipsterdom, YA literature, and much more. Much as in Gorgeous (2013), it’s a whirlwind, laugh-a-minute escapade about a girl swept far outside her comfort zone, with real heart beneath the acid humor. Ages 14–up. Agent: David Kuhn, Kuhn Projects.

Starred review from November 1, 2015
Caitlin Mary Prudence Rectitude Singleberry leads a wholesome, home-schooled life in Parsippany, New Jersey, and enjoys performing with her family (the Singing Singleberries) while waiting to hear from the 12 colleges she's applied to, so what is she doing in jail with her nose pierced, neon hair, and a tattoo? Caitlin blames her cousin Heller Harrigan, who, unlike Caitlin, wasn't raised in a happy, two-parent Christian family but by a ditzy single mother who's changed her name from Nancy to Ecstasy. Until five years ago, the girls were best friends, but Caitlin hasn't seen Heller since, after achieving TV stardom in her tweens, she landed the coveted role of Lynnea in four film adaptations of the blockbuster bestselling Angel Wars trilogy. Celebrity pressures have taken a toll on Heller, just back from four months of rehab. Caitlin, who subdues her crippling anxiety and panic attacks with silent rituals, agrees to keep Heller out of trouble during the movie's premiere weekend in New York and the day Heller's going to spend with a young cancer patient. While reforming Heller, Caitlin intends to settle a few scores. What ensues is a culture clash on steroids. Rudnick's affection for his flawed characters lends emotional depth to the skillful satire. Targets skewered include the symbiotic culture of narcissism binding celebrities and their fans, teen literary cliches, and Brooklyn. Hilarious, irresistible, and oh so timely. (Fiction. 14-18)

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January 1, 2016

Gr 7-10-Caitlin Singleberry is one of nine children, extremely Christian, homeschooled, and a member of her family's musical group. She's led a sheltered life until she must spend a weekend chaperoning her movie star cousin and former best friend, Heller, whom Caitlin hates. After being a Hannah Montana-like child star, Heller has struggled with addiction, is now starring in an adaptation of a book akin to Twilight, and is trying to present a cleaner image. As Caitlin tries to rein Heller in, she finds herself in jail after consuming alcohol, kissing a boy, stealing a car, participating in a kidnapping, and getting a tattoo. This work has several extremes woven throughout the story in terms of plot, character, and instances of caps lock. The protagonist is so religious that she refers to other people as morally compromised and so sheltered that she hasn't even heard of yoga. She suffers from anxiety, some of which stems from a mysterious accident that Heller was involved in four years ago. Caitlin talks about going to see a therapist, but when she is in the midst of a panic attack and Heller hands her a pill that she claims will make it better, Caitlin takes it without asking a lot of questions, which feels problematic. Rudnick has clearly intended to write a satire, but the extremes of the characters and outlandish plot make it feel more hyperbolic than anything else. VERDICT With its too outrageous to be true characters, caps lock style, absurd plot, and potentially problematic treatment of mental health, this title is not a good fit for library collections.-Liz Anderson, D.C. Public Library

Copyright 2016 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

November 1, 2015
Grades 9-12 Rudnick (Gorgeous, 2013) takes on celebrity culture by pitting a Lindsay Lohan/Miley Cyrustype teen star (aptly named Heller) against her upstanding, kneesock-wearing cousin Caitlin, who is a bundle of anxiety and compulsion issues. The weekend before the premiere of Heller's Hunger Games-esque movie, Angel Wars, Caitlin is recruited to keep Heller clean and sober. The problem is, the 17-year-old cousins get along like oil and water. Toss them into a wild 48 hours of media interviews by scandal-hungry TV hosts, eye-rolling stay-out-of-her-way personal assistants, a major reenactment of a battle from the movie, and one out-of-control Make-a-Wish tween, and you have a laugh-out-loud, irreverent tale built on as much snarkiness as sweetness. Rudnick expertly melds the good and the bad of youth and Hollywood without going unbelievably over the edge. Eschewing common sense and exhibiting a great deal of heart, this is one riotously good read.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2015, American Library Association.)