Moran’s default candour continues here ... There are many reasons to read Moran – the demystifying glee around the squelchy stuff, her helter-skelter verbiage, always barrelling towards a zinger of a phrase, her bottomless fount of ideas ... Ultimately, How to Be Famous is less a roman-à-clef than a rollicking fantasy, where everyone is always witty, princes whisk their loves away in business class, and Moran is able to play out some very satisfying 2018 scenarios in 1995 ... The bestselling poptimist has rewritten her past in heroic terms, creating a rollicking fantasy which leaves a rosy afterglow.
Moran's novel is strongest showing an empowered young woman fighting against a society constantly trying to strip her of her value. How to Be Famous explodes with the screams of rock 'n' roll life, but at its heart it's an ode to the tenacity, energy and collective power of teenage girls.
...a dirty, jolly, book-length defense of teenage enthusiasm ... It's a book for someone who has yet to find out that taste is relative, cynicism is cheap, and you should only date people who are kind to you. Despite its treatment of sexual exploitation, How To Be Famous is not dark—it is a joyous, yelping novel about learning to love things without apology or irony. In service to this, metaphors careen all over the book like untrained animals, shedding and slobbering on the carpets. Nuance is lost, repetition is constant, and Moran must always have the last word, even when she's the only one talking. But in a contest between craft and feeling, if I can't have both, I'd take feeling every time. Moran reminds us that playing it cool is a waste of living.
'I feel like all those pictures of the heads of state in the world, where it’s eighty-nine men in suits, and then the Queen, being a woman, on her own' ... This is something articulated beautifully in Moran’s novel, whose bubbly tone belies a profound frustration and sadness that, to all too many, will be relatable ... This, along with other, smaller slights accumulates into a picture of an industry that enables predatory men, and denigrates young women—whether they’re fans, critics, or musicians. How to Be Famous is a subversive celebration of those young women ... Something to always remember is that women talk to each other. And reading How to Be Famous shows how far we can go when we listen to each other, when we see the bad odds, complain to each other over whiskey, and then do the thing anyway, because it’s our job.
Bottled and sold, a woman’s desires could illuminate a large city ... If that idea frightens you, back away slowly from Caitlin Moran’s new novel, How to Be Famous. Everyone else should buckle up for the magical mystery tour that is life with Dolly Wilde, the up-and-coming music journalist with Champagne dreams and a Mad Dog budget ... Stylewise, Ms. Moran’s writing is a breath of fresh air in the often stuffy, overly serious world of women’s fiction. Her sentences crackle with sass but also reveal the vulnerability that lies beneath many a modern woman’s confident exterior. Rude, crude and incredibly lewd, the world-wise Dolly persona protects Johanna from serious emotional harm and buys her time to come to terms with the adult situations in which she finds her still-teenage self ... in the end, it’s Ms. Moran’s ferocious tenderness and stubborn optimism that make How to Be Famous the perfect summer read for riot grrls, rainy day women, and the John Kites who love them.
Moran has always been a gloriously acute and funny writer, and the combination of memoir and make-believe here gives her plenty of scope to exercise her considerable ability to entertain. Her descriptions of the music and media worlds of 1990s London are brilliantly recognisable, and Suzanne Banks, the chaotic and charismatic lead singer of feminist girl band The Branks, leaps off the page—she’s a fantastic creation. Naturally, the book is peppered with jokes, Moran’s trademark wordplay and some snappy one-liners ... But there are problems. Would an impoverished teenage music journalist in 1994 really have owned a laptop, but not a Walkman? ... there is the issue of the book’s tense, which slides around unpredictably ... Such a slip may be surprising from such an experienced writer, but it’s the result of an instability at the very heart of ... this funny, warm, insightful but ultimately half-formed book.
Caitlin Moran’s new novel has a lot of sex and private parts in it ... look away if you're feeling fragile ... [It] will have Moran’s female fans giggling and crying in sympathy ... It’s quite a ride, this book. It’s laugh-out-loud funny, sweetly romantic and fiercely angry. Often all at once.
How to Be Famous, the new novel from Caitlin Moran, reads like poptimism in book form. It sparkles and fizzes, romping along even when its subject matter turns dark, and veering blissfully toward the best-case scenario whenever it can. And it never, ever turns away from its conviction that teenage girls must be defended to the death ... Is there an element of wish fulfillment here? Maybe. But if there’s anything teenage girls are due for, it’s an emotionally grounded book that respects them and what they can do, sees their vulnerabilities and weaknesses, and is still willing to give them a happy ending—even if that book is marketed to adults rather than to teens themselves. And How to Be Famous is that book.
Caitlin Moran has a gift—in both short- and long-form writing, in both fiction and nonfiction—that hits like magic when it lands in the lap of the right reader. It’s a rare, mesmerizing talent ... How to Be Famous lives or dies based on Moran’s ability to render Dolly as an enchanting, vulnerable and hilarious guide through the mid-1990s London music scene, and Dolly’s charm immediately jumps off the page ... [Moran's] ambition, like Dolly’s, is to weave into this tale a kind of feminist manifesto ... She succeeds throughout but keeps you waiting for the final, unforgettable exclamation point at the book’s hysterical climax.
Moran’s rollicking second novel (after How to Build a Girl) characteristically combines nonstop witticisms with razor-sharp, pointed, and timely cultural critique ... Moran’s depiction of London is detailed and exuberant, and a convincing backdrop ... Better still, her characters are madcap and lovable but nuanced enough to feel real ... With Dolly, Moran has created an excellent heroine that readers will enjoy spending a summer day with.
Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay[/caption]
