Raw

August 5, 2013
A goofy streak leavens Smith’s fifth novel, an overly broad satire that takes potshots at reality TV, the Internet, and the publishing industry. Former beach volleyball player Sepp Gregory, who became a household name by winning the steamy hidden-camera show Sex Crib, is famous for his abs and his romance with fellow contestant Roxy Sandoval. Now his adoring public swarms to meet him on the book tour for his novel, Totally Reality, while his ghostwriter, Curtis Berman, sulks in hipster obscurity in Brooklyn. The novel’s critical and commercial success enrages Curtis as well as blogger Harriet Post, who decides to confront Sepp on his tour and expose him as a literary fraud. But Sepp has bigger problems: his once-legendary libido still hasn’t recovered from his breakup with Roxy, and now she plans to write her own tell-all about their split. When the exes collide at the Playboy Club with Harriet and Curtis in tow, Sepp realizes he has to break free. Smith overplays his hand early with characters drawn to extremes (one is described as having an “Easy Bake Oven head”) and later forced to meet in the vague middle, but he packs his paragraphs with cleverness, mapping out a soapy, exciting plot. When Sepp goes off course, his unpredictable path gets seamy but leaves a glimmer of hope for a self-obsessed society—at least for one willing to laugh at itself.

November 1, 2013
LA writer Smith is back with another frothy satire (Moist, 2007, etc.). This time out, the focus is on America's most beloved abs, which belong to Sepp Gregory, a reality TV star who parlayed conspicuous muscle and a broken heart on a show called Sex Cribs into a follow-up series and then glossy-magazine and tabloid celebrity. Now, he's written--or at least is purported to have written--an autobiographical novel called Totally Reality. He's making shirtless appearances in thronged bookstores everywhere but also struggling with a secret case of impotence; it turns out that behind that rock-hard six-pack is a sweet and simple soul who needs to be in love in order to perform. Enter Harriet Post, a ferociously snobby (but, natch, demurely lovely) literary blogger and wannabe novelist who sees, in the blindly ecstatic reception of the novel, all the signs of impending apocalypse. She vows to out the ghostwriter and expose the vapid Sepp. After a scene of steamy four-way farce in the Playboy Mansion's library--a scene featuring Sepp, Harriet, the ghostwriter and the surgically enhanced belle dame sans merci who seduced and then abandoned Sepp on Sex Cribs--there's a terrible accident, and Harriet and Sepp find themselves on the lam in the desert, where what starts as a case of lust threatens to blossom into something more. Smith plays it fast and very, very loose in his sendup of celebrity culture, TV and literary publishing, and a good bit of this is just cheerful porn wearing the scantiest fig leaf of wit. Satire doesn't get any broader or easier, but that doesn't mean that the book's not at least fitfully fun.

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October 15, 2013
In this thoroughly enjoyable outing, consummate satirist Haskell Smith (Baked, 2010) pokes delirious fun at modern-day book publishing and reality TV. As the novel opens, reality-TV star Sepp Gregory is on tour to promote his debut novel, Totally Reality. (He didn't write the book, of course; the chap who penned the prose is supererudite Curtis, who told Sepp's sordid life story so eloquently that even the New York Times gave it a rave review.) But ghostwriting isn't a crime, right? It is for blogosphere luminary Harriet, who considers Sepp's book one of the signs of literary Armageddon. She's determined to out the ghostwriter, even if it means sabotaging Sepp's book tour. Which is exactly what she does. Before she knows it, Harriet, a bookish babe in her own right, finds herself on the road (and between the sheets) with Sepp. (An unlikely pair if there ever was one, Harriet flashes her intellect, while Sepp flashes his abs.) By turns racy and profound, Haskell Smith writes at Mach speed about what passes for culture in today's often unreal world.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)