How I Became a Famous Novelist
Ratings6
Average rating3.8
15
Ratings6
Average rating3.8
This story of a slacker who sets out to take the book-publishing world by storm is “a hilarious send-up of literary pretensions and celebrity culture.” (USA Today). Pete Tarslaw wants some fame and fortune and, perhaps most importantly, the chance to get back at his ex-girlfriend at her upcoming wedding. After listening to a vapid author prattling on during an interview, while nubile young women watch adoringly, he figures becoming a literary icon must be the easiest con game going . . . This “gleeful skewering of the publishing industry and every cliché of the writing life” pinballs from the college town of Boston to the fear-drenched halls of Manhattan’s publishing houses, from the gloomy purity of Montana’s foremost writing workshop to the hedonistic hotel bars of the Sunset Strip (The New York Times Book Review). The tale of how Pete’s “pile of garbage” titled The Tornado Ashes Club became the most talked about, blogged about, admired, and reviled novel in America will change everything you think you know about literature, truth, beauty, and those people out there who actually still care about books. “Nothing is sacred and all is skewered: critics, Hollywood, MFA programs, students, literary journals, panels, conferences and resulting hook-ups . . . I rooted for Pete, a scheming underachiever whom the late great humorist Max Shulman would have been proud to call his own. I may have read a funnier book in the last 20 years, but at this moment I’m hard-pressed to name it.” —Elinor Lipman, The Washington Post “A pitch-perfect takeoff on the insipid conventions of the best-seller racks . . . caustic wit with an unexpected depth of emotional insight.” —Austin American-Statesman “How I Became a Famous Novelist has a laugh-out-loud quotient inappropriately high for reading in public.” —St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Reviews with the most likes.
A biting satire of modern literature.
I was a little worried that a novel satirizing modern literature might be a little on the meta side, but How I Became a Famous Novelist is down to earth and veers to keep a wide berth from being self-referential.
The fictional novels clearly give nod to real world counterparts and their titles and descriptions are the funniest part of the book.
For once, reading about a complete self-absorbed, under-productive scumbag is entertaining, rather than tedious. Likely, the insight into his own odious nature helps make the protagonist less tooth-grating.
hilarious, over the top (yet probably really tamer than reality) satire about the publishing industry and the selling/making of books. Not literature, but the stuff that people read (or at least by). Best satire I've read in a long while
This is very light reading about a guy who figures out that many of the authors on the current bestseller lists are just really good con-artists and he wants in. He comes up with some hilarious rules for writing a bestseller and sets off to write a schlocky romance-and-redemption story filled with heinous clichés and such. He also wants to be famous just so he can upstage his ex-girlfriend at her upcoming wedding. But the character's trashing of the bestselling ilk that passes for entertainment these days is the good stuff. It's often quite funny and possibly hits pretty close to home on occasion. This book can be read very quickly and should appeal to the cynic in you. Oh, also: all the blurbs are fake.
