I MAKE MY OWN FUN, a title you'll look at differently after the read

I MAKE MY OWN FUN
HANNAH BEER
House of Anansi Press (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$19.99 paperback, available now

Rating: 4.5* of five

The Publisher Says: An unhinged romp through fame, obsession, and fandom

Everyone knows Marina, the A-list movie star. But very few know Marina, the absolute monster.

Years at the top have proved that whatever Marina wants, she gets. But when she meets bartender Anna, Marina discovers something that can't be Anna's affection. As Anna remains unmoved, Marina's advances become more desperate, and her obsession more dangerous.

The price of fame is heavy—and someone will have to pay for it …

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: Mmmkay...so...see it's like this. There is not one shred of realism in this weirdness. Marina has five Oscars and she got them when not yet thirty.

Five. OSCARS.

Park them carpin' natterin' nabobs of emotional negativity in the punchbowl, y'all. Go with it. So Marina's in London for...something, I forgot what, doing her "Miss Relatable Superstar oh I'm just plain folks" shtik that sells out theaters, bored with the fact it keeps working, but nothing gonna change her runnin' the con, because a superstar girl's gotta feed the hordes of hangers-on. Marina goes out, worn out after another day of faking sincerity in search of booze and babes (the hot PR-inspired boyfriend is with his little sidequest lad—everybody's bi). (Oh, Marina? She likes girls too.)

And there SHE is: Anna the food-service worker, starstruck and ripe for the plucking. Marina plucks, well tries to anyway. Anna is...not impressed.

This cannot be allowed. You just know the whole world, from the folks Marina catfishes on various dating apps to the fellow A-lister "friends" she's secretly fed to the internet wolves for shits and giggles, has always fallen right into or back into her orbit at the merest crook of a pinky from Marina. Anna, though, declines the part she's been cast to play.

I hope you saw Tár. Marina's the Hollywood version of her, very very sure she is worth all the trouble and pain she causes all around her because she is A Star. There is more than a little of the Fatal Attraction thing goin' on with the way Anna keeps ducking out and trying to get away, which Marina's sure is just playing hard to get. Not so much Marina...Anna sees your real face and wants no part of looking into the abyss of selfishness and self-regard you represent. You're running out of time, passing the line of 30 aka career death, and Anna is failing to hide your desperation and trappedness from you...how dare she?! You *deserve* Anna's utter devotion! You're YOU!

Bitter, angry celebrity-obsessed woman caught in what she knows inside is the beginning of the end refuses to examine her actual reality to see what she wants to try next. Told in a headlong, obsessive rush, maybe even too much of one, Author Beer's debut novel is a howl of outrage that the /marinas of the world get as far as they do, that what the Marinas of the world do to others is only partial repayment and charged to the wrong account for what's done to them. The ending, honestly rushed and abrupt, works because there are unreliable narrators like Christie's Dr. Sheppard, and then there are the Marinas. This ending, abrupt as it is, makes the sheer awfulness of Marina fluoresce. It's so so sad, and so so appropriate, and just truly satisfying for what it subtextually points to.

There is not one soul in this book I felt like I wanted to rescue, teach sense to, or even get to know better. I know it's a novel but it truthfully made me look askance at everyone involved in the celebrity-influencer world again.

Summer sudsy thriller fun! I say feed your inner cynic a story to keep it from gluing you to the next season of The Traitors.