fiction
A Star is Bored is the story of a man who lands the dream job he never
knew he needed, working as a personal assistant for a famous actress. The description says it is loosely based on the author, Byron Lane’s, time working as Carrie Fisher’s personal assistant in real life. Then
it goes out of its way at the beginning to disclaim that characters and events
are purely fictional. However, I still pictured Carrie Fisher as the actress
throughout the entire novel since he gave her a backstory so similar to Carrie
Fisher’s. So one can’t help but wonder how
much of this is really fiction.
This is a very endearing tale of a man who had a miserable
childhood and has no real sense of self-worth but learns to appreciate life
while helping a spoiled, troubled, unrealistic, addict stay alive. It’s simultaneously about the crazy
lifestyles of the rich and famous and the more personal story of a man who is
able to save himself with a little help.
His growth, good intentions, and kindness make the reader fall in love
with him. His heartwarming journey is balanced by the actress’ story which is
self-harming and unrepentant. I really
enjoyed the contrasts and the lessons learned by the characters.
I had not expected to like this novel since I’m not one to
care much about individual entertainers’ personal lives. But since it was a
book club book with a promise to be a “lighter read”, given all the worry and
strife in our real lives these days, I gave it a try. And I’m so glad I did! I
really enjoyed it.
The audiobook narrator, Noah Galvin, was terrific. His voice acting was spot on and his voice repertoire was impressive, especially female voices! However, he had several "after the fact" insertions where it sounded like he went back to re-record a few segments and they sounded completely foreign in the midst of the original recording--a different voice timbre and in a different recording space. Poor form on the production. Therefore, I can't give him more than an A.
No comments:
Post a Comment