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Oh! You Pretty Things
“A Hollywood native from the wrong side of the Walk of Fame makes a play for star status” ( Cosmopolitan ) in Shanna Mahin’s acclaimed novel, called “quite a breakout” by The New York Times .
Jess Dunne is third-generation Hollywood, but her star on the boulevard has yet to materialize. Sure, she’s got a Santa Monica address and a working actress roommate, but with her nowhere barista job in a town that acknowledges zeroes only as a dress size, she’s a dead girl walking.
Enter Jess’s mother—a failed actress who puts the strange in estrangement. She dives headlong into her daughter’s downward spiral, forcing Jess to muster all her spite and self-preservation to snag a career upgrade.
As a personal assistant for a famous (and secretly agoraphobic) film composer, Jess’s workdays are now filled with shopping for luxury goods and cooking in his perfectly designed kitchen. Jess kills at cooking, a talent that only serves her intensifying urge to dig in to Los Angeles’s celebrity buffet.
When her food garners the attention of an actress on the rise, well, she’s all too willing to throw it in with the composer and upgrade again, a decision that will have far-reaching ramifications that could explode all her relationships.
All the while, her mother looms ever closer, forcing Jess to confront the traumatic secrets she’s been running from all her life.
Oh! You Pretty Things is a dizzying ride at the carnival of fame, a fast-paced and sharply funny work that dares to imagine what happens when we go over the top in a town of gilded excess.
Jess Dunne is third-generation Hollywood, but her star on the boulevard has yet to materialize. Sure, she’s got a Santa Monica address and a working actress roommate, but with her nowhere barista job in a town that acknowledges zeroes only as a dress size, she’s a dead girl walking.
Enter Jess’s mother—a failed actress who puts the strange in estrangement. She dives headlong into her daughter’s downward spiral, forcing Jess to muster all her spite and self-preservation to snag a career upgrade.
As a personal assistant for a famous (and secretly agoraphobic) film composer, Jess’s workdays are now filled with shopping for luxury goods and cooking in his perfectly designed kitchen. Jess kills at cooking, a talent that only serves her intensifying urge to dig in to Los Angeles’s celebrity buffet.
When her food garners the attention of an actress on the rise, well, she’s all too willing to throw it in with the composer and upgrade again, a decision that will have far-reaching ramifications that could explode all her relationships.
All the while, her mother looms ever closer, forcing Jess to confront the traumatic secrets she’s been running from all her life.
Oh! You Pretty Things is a dizzying ride at the carnival of fame, a fast-paced and sharply funny work that dares to imagine what happens when we go over the top in a town of gilded excess.
368 pages, Hardcover
First published April 14, 2015
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2761 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 295 reviews
June 21, 2015
I wanted to love this book and there is a lot of good going on in these pages. Jess is a third generation native of Hollywood who yearns to be closer to fame, has a complicated relationship with her mother, and a trauma from her past that stays with her though she might not admit that. Strong characters, strong premise, but alas, there was not enough plot here. At times it felt like, well this is what these characters are up to today and that's fun but I wanted it all to go somewhere. There was also this undercurrent of critiquing consumerism and celebrity but no follow through on that, either. Worth reading, but I wanted more from the novel.
March 23, 2015
Do not let Shanna Mahin’s formidable talent for punchy sentences and sardonic humor fool you. "Oh! You Pretty Things" is more than a beach read. Beneath all that cynicism lies a smart, insightful dissection of the legacy of a narcissistic mother who projects her unrealized dreams and deepest class shames onto her daughter. And yet, the novel never leaps off the precipice into total darkness. It’s enough to hint at it, to peel back the curtain. It takes an incredible writer to control her craft the way Shanna Mahin has done. And in a way, her control of the story mirrors the celebrity world about which she writes, where everyone must control their narrative at all costs. Shanna Mahin is the kind of writer who SEES people, really SEES them. Her observations are sharp, smart, sometimes biting, but also insightful. She “gets” why people do what they do. You will have so much fun reading this book, and you will also wish you had half the shrewdness of its author.
August 7, 2018
Warning: Incoming scathing review.
Good lordy, why did I finish reading this? Why did I continue reading this when everyone around me rightfully asked, "how is your book?" Terrible, I would answer. "Why are you continuing to read it?" I don't know. I wasn't hoping for a change between the superficial mindless drivel at the beginning, thinking somehow this would coalesce into some meaningful incredible leap of writing skills at the end.....but yet, I kept turning the page. Should that warrant something positive? I say, decidedly not!
The concept does warrant pretty pedestrian reading: hollywood gossip, a main character hyper focused on every superficial thing in vicinity and obsessed with TMZ, and a lineage of white privilege and nepotism so deep the author may or may not realize the irony of the writing within. The structure of the book is akin to a 10th grade diary - everything explained to the reader is in past tense, days or months may go by with no warning to the reader except a passing intro to a paragraph of, "a few weeks later..." character development - between characters is never shown, and the actions between characters is described as one would write it out in a journal that they would then post as a blog online, ripe with gossip, the wink to the reader because obviously everyone will want to read this witty immensely imaginative, self aware tell all. Except it's none of those things. The main character never gets a center and as such you never even know what they are about, the backstory is so tangentially and unedited and thoughtless that when it comes up you barely care or remember it, the writing is not witty at all.
The only form of validity in this thing happens in 2-3 places - there are sparks of something immensely interesting when the author calls out moments of feeling powerful and righteous at very morally or ethically or emotionally sensitive and frankly questionable times. These are the things that they should write about, that was the only place i sensed any truth - and it was profound and intriguing. I wanted to read more about THAT.
Good lordy, why did I finish reading this? Why did I continue reading this when everyone around me rightfully asked, "how is your book?" Terrible, I would answer. "Why are you continuing to read it?" I don't know. I wasn't hoping for a change between the superficial mindless drivel at the beginning, thinking somehow this would coalesce into some meaningful incredible leap of writing skills at the end.....but yet, I kept turning the page. Should that warrant something positive? I say, decidedly not!
The concept does warrant pretty pedestrian reading: hollywood gossip, a main character hyper focused on every superficial thing in vicinity and obsessed with TMZ, and a lineage of white privilege and nepotism so deep the author may or may not realize the irony of the writing within. The structure of the book is akin to a 10th grade diary - everything explained to the reader is in past tense, days or months may go by with no warning to the reader except a passing intro to a paragraph of, "a few weeks later..." character development - between characters is never shown, and the actions between characters is described as one would write it out in a journal that they would then post as a blog online, ripe with gossip, the wink to the reader because obviously everyone will want to read this witty immensely imaginative, self aware tell all. Except it's none of those things. The main character never gets a center and as such you never even know what they are about, the backstory is so tangentially and unedited and thoughtless that when it comes up you barely care or remember it, the writing is not witty at all.
The only form of validity in this thing happens in 2-3 places - there are sparks of something immensely interesting when the author calls out moments of feeling powerful and righteous at very morally or ethically or emotionally sensitive and frankly questionable times. These are the things that they should write about, that was the only place i sensed any truth - and it was profound and intriguing. I wanted to read more about THAT.
June 12, 2021
I purchased this book (used, thank god) because it was praised by Cheryl Strayed, whom I adore, and because I will be spending 10 days in L.A. this October and I wanted to get a feel for the city from an author who grew up there.
If I had read this book before planning my trip, with the possibility of the trip in mind, I would maybe not be going to L.A.
Our narrator Jess is floundering at 29 - recently divorced, living with her best friend in a crappy apartment, working a dead end job as a barista and barely making any tips. A new coworker offers to hook her up with a celebrity personal assistant gig, and she enters of the world of working for the stars, soon moving up from a D-list to a B-list employer after wowing a big time actress with her cooking skills. That's the basic jist of the story. I expected a "young woman grows through a Devil Meets Prada tyrannical celebrity boss" sort of scenario.
There's a little bit of that, but mostly the book reads as the main character/first person narrator's quest for approval and validation. There is a serious Mary Sue situation happening here. For example, Jess cooks some food or baristas some coffee for some famous person and downplays her skills "humbly," only to have the famous person, eyes rolling back in their head, tell her it is the best thing they have ever tasted in the entire world.
Jess says she feels frumpy next to a celebrity? They tell her she's super gorgeous.
Jess tells us she has no magnetism with men, but a really hot guy that L.A. "yoga sylphs" fawn over pursues her for no discernible reason and seems totally cool with waiting around for her despite the fact that she keeps ditching him to attend to her celebrity.
Jess feels like her size 10 is too high for L.A.? Don't worry, she's got a size 14 friend to keep mentioning the wideness of in comparison!
Jess's celebrity boss has horrible taste in home decor? Don't worry: Jess can give a verbal redecoration of the house in minutes that gets a seasoned interior designer to the stars' full seal of approval!
It would be grating enough the Mahin insists on boosting her main character improbably at every turn, but then it also seems as though Mahin wants a seal of approval on her taste in everything, from coffee to NY delis to her taste in TV and pop culture. The point I'm getting at is that Jess, for the most part, doesn't feel like a real person so much as an extension of the author's personal opinions, quirks, and neuroses. And it's fine to want to put those things out in the world because we all do, but maybe...start a blog?
For featuring a narrator with such strongly stated opinions, Mahin totally contradicts those opinions with no problem. Jess thinks clove cigarettes are disgusting and sneers at her size 14 friend for thinking they are better than old-fashioned American Spirits or Parliaments...and then in the span of one page, bums one off of her. In the beginning of the book Jess describes herself as "hardly what you could call a morning person" who struggles to receive a text at 8 AM, but in the middle and end of the book she claims that it is a tradition for her to take early morning walks. ???
***
The other part of the plot of Oh! You Pretty Things that gets weighed down by the narrator's voice is that all of Jess's relationships suffer as a result of her and her friends' proximity to celebrity (her best friend Megan is a working actress who begins dating a B-list male actor; her other female friend, Scout, is coincidentally the best friend of Jess's female B-list celebrity employer). Jess's narcissistic, manipulative ex-child actress mother is also in town trying to get back into Jess's life.
The friendships in this book seem rather immature for friendships between almost-30 year olds, but maybe this is the byproduct of L.A. culture. The problems within them are of course tied up with a little bow at the end, without any serious attempt at talking them through. The subplot with Jess's mom is easily the most compelling plot in the book, but as I didn't care for mother or daughter and it ends to poor emotional resolution, I found that hard to care about by the end too.
So both of these plots fell flat.
***
A big part of me thought, mid-seething annoyance every time I picked up this book again to find out I had 200 or 100 pages left, that I was being too harsh on it. That maybe I am taking it too seriously for a bit of frothy commentary on consumerism and celebrity culture that pervades L.A. Then I'd read a passage of Jess coyly admitting that she loves being so close to the sparkle of celebrity, or that she is glued to gossip blogs, or casually namedrops her Prada shoes, or mentions that she'd get rhinoplasty and is "down with plastic surgery" or some such similar thing, and I'm like "...but is this really satire, though?"
I happened to see Ingrid Goes West today and felt that that film's jabs at L.A. consumer culture and one-upmanship were much more effective than this book. If you are considering reading Oh! You Pretty Things hoping for satire, I'd suggest going to the movies instead.
If I had read this book before planning my trip, with the possibility of the trip in mind, I would maybe not be going to L.A.
Our narrator Jess is floundering at 29 - recently divorced, living with her best friend in a crappy apartment, working a dead end job as a barista and barely making any tips. A new coworker offers to hook her up with a celebrity personal assistant gig, and she enters of the world of working for the stars, soon moving up from a D-list to a B-list employer after wowing a big time actress with her cooking skills. That's the basic jist of the story. I expected a "young woman grows through a Devil Meets Prada tyrannical celebrity boss" sort of scenario.
There's a little bit of that, but mostly the book reads as the main character/first person narrator's quest for approval and validation. There is a serious Mary Sue situation happening here. For example, Jess cooks some food or baristas some coffee for some famous person and downplays her skills "humbly," only to have the famous person, eyes rolling back in their head, tell her it is the best thing they have ever tasted in the entire world.
Jess says she feels frumpy next to a celebrity? They tell her she's super gorgeous.
Jess tells us she has no magnetism with men, but a really hot guy that L.A. "yoga sylphs" fawn over pursues her for no discernible reason and seems totally cool with waiting around for her despite the fact that she keeps ditching him to attend to her celebrity.
Jess feels like her size 10 is too high for L.A.? Don't worry, she's got a size 14 friend to keep mentioning the wideness of in comparison!
Jess's celebrity boss has horrible taste in home decor? Don't worry: Jess can give a verbal redecoration of the house in minutes that gets a seasoned interior designer to the stars' full seal of approval!
It would be grating enough the Mahin insists on boosting her main character improbably at every turn, but then it also seems as though Mahin wants a seal of approval on her taste in everything, from coffee to NY delis to her taste in TV and pop culture. The point I'm getting at is that Jess, for the most part, doesn't feel like a real person so much as an extension of the author's personal opinions, quirks, and neuroses. And it's fine to want to put those things out in the world because we all do, but maybe...start a blog?
For featuring a narrator with such strongly stated opinions, Mahin totally contradicts those opinions with no problem. Jess thinks clove cigarettes are disgusting and sneers at her size 14 friend for thinking they are better than old-fashioned American Spirits or Parliaments...and then in the span of one page, bums one off of her. In the beginning of the book Jess describes herself as "hardly what you could call a morning person" who struggles to receive a text at 8 AM, but in the middle and end of the book she claims that it is a tradition for her to take early morning walks. ???
***
The other part of the plot of Oh! You Pretty Things that gets weighed down by the narrator's voice is that all of Jess's relationships suffer as a result of her and her friends' proximity to celebrity (her best friend Megan is a working actress who begins dating a B-list male actor; her other female friend, Scout, is coincidentally the best friend of Jess's female B-list celebrity employer). Jess's narcissistic, manipulative ex-child actress mother is also in town trying to get back into Jess's life.
The friendships in this book seem rather immature for friendships between almost-30 year olds, but maybe this is the byproduct of L.A. culture. The problems within them are of course tied up with a little bow at the end, without any serious attempt at talking them through. The subplot with Jess's mom is easily the most compelling plot in the book, but as I didn't care for mother or daughter and it ends to poor emotional resolution, I found that hard to care about by the end too.
So both of these plots fell flat.
***
A big part of me thought, mid-seething annoyance every time I picked up this book again to find out I had 200 or 100 pages left, that I was being too harsh on it. That maybe I am taking it too seriously for a bit of frothy commentary on consumerism and celebrity culture that pervades L.A. Then I'd read a passage of Jess coyly admitting that she loves being so close to the sparkle of celebrity, or that she is glued to gossip blogs, or casually namedrops her Prada shoes, or mentions that she'd get rhinoplasty and is "down with plastic surgery" or some such similar thing, and I'm like "...but is this really satire, though?"
I happened to see Ingrid Goes West today and felt that that film's jabs at L.A. consumer culture and one-upmanship were much more effective than this book. If you are considering reading Oh! You Pretty Things hoping for satire, I'd suggest going to the movies instead.
June 6, 2015
Ok.... Maybe I'm the asshole here... But this book was garbage. I think if you're older than 20, or just aren't very fond of the bubblegum pop cliche writing, this isn't the right novel for you. I'm a fan of celebrity gossip, I'm fairly young, I speak my generational slang. This book was just trying too hard. It was attempting to be hip, to be funny, smart and witty. I didn't get a sense of any of that. It reeked of desperation. I rolled my eyes so many times I lost count. The author peppered in vocabulary you just knew she didn't even know the definitions to. It read as if she just googled synonyms for ____ and injected them into the first draft. The story progressed, but it really had no solid backbone or plot. It was weird, like a blob of an unknown gelatinous substance just sitting there.
I finished the book because I paid for it and I couldn't return it anymore (ordered it on my kindle and let it sit there for two weeks before cracking it open). I give this book two stars instead of one because I didn't fall asleep and at least I was able to finish it. I was also rooting for the protagonist, Jess, by the end of it. But when I mean the end, I mean literally the last 10 pages.
One more positive attribute: if this trite, recycled crap can get published, I have some newfound confidence I can get a book deal, too. Better start on it now.
I finished the book because I paid for it and I couldn't return it anymore (ordered it on my kindle and let it sit there for two weeks before cracking it open). I give this book two stars instead of one because I didn't fall asleep and at least I was able to finish it. I was also rooting for the protagonist, Jess, by the end of it. But when I mean the end, I mean literally the last 10 pages.
One more positive attribute: if this trite, recycled crap can get published, I have some newfound confidence I can get a book deal, too. Better start on it now.
June 29, 2015
I would have given it 4 stars if not for some of the rookie flaws. The plot isn't particularly original (girl down in the dumps, becomes dazzled by fancy job opportunities and exciting but shallow new acquaintances who turn out to be awful people who fail the girl, girl learns lesson and sticks to her true blue friends), but the writing is entertaining. I love the sharp detail, at least up to the point where it becomes cumbersome (I get that Grandma Gloria was a good parent, I don't need a million examples of the responsible things she did in contrast to Mommie Dearest), and some of the characters' back stories were lacking (Jess has never known her father, which is apparently a trivial detail because it's barely mentioned; she's divorced, which is mentioned plenty, but little is said about the marriage itself or the ex-spouse). And I found the concept of Jess being obsessed with celebrity culture bizarre considering she has lived the worst of it: her horrible former-child-star mother, failed auditions, and sleazy director experiences. But I guess that's supposed to be her main flaw, or something? Anyway, I enjoyed the book and hope to see more from this author once she gets better editors.
October 4, 2015
1.5 stars.
First, I have to admit that this was not the book that I thought I was reading. And then I just continued. Barely. Herein lies everything wrong with chick lit: Plucky heroine finds herself in wacky situations and ultimately realizes that down deep she has real value as a person. And combine that with a trite plot about Hollywood hangers-on, and I truly wonder what all the 4 and 5 star reviewers are smoking. This is lazy writing with zero imagination behind it.
First, I have to admit that this was not the book that I thought I was reading. And then I just continued. Barely. Herein lies everything wrong with chick lit: Plucky heroine finds herself in wacky situations and ultimately realizes that down deep she has real value as a person. And combine that with a trite plot about Hollywood hangers-on, and I truly wonder what all the 4 and 5 star reviewers are smoking. This is lazy writing with zero imagination behind it.
December 15, 2017
This book provided the most shallow and embarrassing illustrations of female friendships I've ever read. Cheryl Strayed of Wild and Janet Finch of White Oleander fame recommended it. how could they? I trusted them! boo, would give it zero, but then it doesn't register as a rating, actually I'd give it a -5, bad.
January 30, 2016
If there's a type of conflict I tend to find interesting in books, films, and IRL, it's the whole "townies vs. tourists" thing and its many variations (locals vs. students, "summer people," transplants, etc.). It's especially interesting and important to hear the perspectives of native residents who are too often pushed to the margins or compromised in areas that have become overrun by people moving there for other purposes, such as industry, schooling, recreation, or just plain development and gentrification.
This book offers such a perspective through the point of view of its protagonist, a working-class, third-generation Hollywood resident who is well familiar with the silver screen and celebrity scene there and yet solidly remains an outsider relative to that scene, even as she knows the Hollywood streets inside and out and expertly navigates the politics and other tics of this difficult and elite microculture. Because she planted her flag there first, she's not so easily excluded by the exclusionary forces that have taken over the city, and so she is able to offer an entertaining, behind the scenes, native's view of LA and Hollywood that we don't often remember or see. The result is an energetic, descriptive, engaging read with a few fascinating characters and some great dialogue.
When I clearly enjoy a book, as I did this one, and yet rate it a 3, it means I recommend the book and found it a good read overall, yet had some kind of significant reservation about it. In this case, I hesitated to fully buy the protagonist character in one major way: she has a full-on celebrity obsession that I found unrealistic given her history and the rest of her character, and that I also found annoying because I'm completely uninterested in celebrity culture myself. I read books largely to escape all the gushing over celebrities that takes place elsewhere, so I was annoyed to encounter much gushing over celebrities (both real and fictitious) in the pages of this book.
My second reservation about this book was that although there are a few extremely vivid characters in the book, there were an equal number of characters I found quite underdrawn. In particular, the protagonist's mother, who is important in the plot, is an unbelievable and not very fleshed out character - sort of a Blanche DuBois type of caricature. However, I'd chalk this up to debut novel issues, and the author is successful enough elsewhere and overall to compensate.
In all, a very engaging read that I enjoyed over vacation, and a really enjoyable setting as shown through the protagonist's eyes. Glad I stumbled upon this book completely accidentally, and hope to see more work from her down the road!
This book offers such a perspective through the point of view of its protagonist, a working-class, third-generation Hollywood resident who is well familiar with the silver screen and celebrity scene there and yet solidly remains an outsider relative to that scene, even as she knows the Hollywood streets inside and out and expertly navigates the politics and other tics of this difficult and elite microculture. Because she planted her flag there first, she's not so easily excluded by the exclusionary forces that have taken over the city, and so she is able to offer an entertaining, behind the scenes, native's view of LA and Hollywood that we don't often remember or see. The result is an energetic, descriptive, engaging read with a few fascinating characters and some great dialogue.
When I clearly enjoy a book, as I did this one, and yet rate it a 3, it means I recommend the book and found it a good read overall, yet had some kind of significant reservation about it. In this case, I hesitated to fully buy the protagonist character in one major way: she has a full-on celebrity obsession that I found unrealistic given her history and the rest of her character, and that I also found annoying because I'm completely uninterested in celebrity culture myself. I read books largely to escape all the gushing over celebrities that takes place elsewhere, so I was annoyed to encounter much gushing over celebrities (both real and fictitious) in the pages of this book.
My second reservation about this book was that although there are a few extremely vivid characters in the book, there were an equal number of characters I found quite underdrawn. In particular, the protagonist's mother, who is important in the plot, is an unbelievable and not very fleshed out character - sort of a Blanche DuBois type of caricature. However, I'd chalk this up to debut novel issues, and the author is successful enough elsewhere and overall to compensate.
In all, a very engaging read that I enjoyed over vacation, and a really enjoyable setting as shown through the protagonist's eyes. Glad I stumbled upon this book completely accidentally, and hope to see more work from her down the road!
April 25, 2015
What the hell? This book was all over the place.
A love interest appeared on page 152. I literally had to page through the whole first half of the book to figure out where she knew him from. He's in maybe three awkward scenes, no chemistry apparent, and then he's absent again until the final chapter.
The relationships the main character had with everyone (her mom, her best friend, her one other friend, her ex-husband, her childhood molester, her employers) were so dysfunctional that I couldn't figure out why she had any of these people in her life.
Her references to financial troubles, and then casual references to the money she spent all over town (on groceries, cabs, rent, etc.) just didn't match up at all. Why bother to mention them?
It was a quick read.
A love interest appeared on page 152. I literally had to page through the whole first half of the book to figure out where she knew him from. He's in maybe three awkward scenes, no chemistry apparent, and then he's absent again until the final chapter.
The relationships the main character had with everyone (her mom, her best friend, her one other friend, her ex-husband, her childhood molester, her employers) were so dysfunctional that I couldn't figure out why she had any of these people in her life.
Her references to financial troubles, and then casual references to the money she spent all over town (on groceries, cabs, rent, etc.) just didn't match up at all. Why bother to mention them?
It was a quick read.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 5, 2015
I really didn't care for this. The characters, the story, the writing style, none of it. Selfish people doing selfish things over and over again with no development at all.
I want to say it was missing some key element that almost made it a book I could enjoy, but I can't really put my finger on it.
I want to say it was missing some key element that almost made it a book I could enjoy, but I can't really put my finger on it.
April 10, 2015
I guess you could say that I really really really like movies, tv shows, and knowing all things about celebrities. I love reality TV and enjoy watching E! News with my sister. So when I saw that the main character of this book was in the midst of the hollywood life I love so much but not actually one of them herself, I knew I had to read it!
As third-generation Hollywood, Jess has felt the pressure from her not-so-present mother to be the star and show their family proud. Pretty early on, though, it was clear that Jess was not destined for fame. When she's fired from her job as a barista because she's not hip or young enough anymore, Jess snags the job as the personal assistant to a Hollywood composer in the world she loves so much. Jess soon finds herself running errands and cooking for the man until her cooking garners the attention of an up-coming actress. Jess dives head first into the celebrity world and realizes it's not all that it's cracked up to be.
The one thing that can make or break a book is the main character. For me, I'm still not so sure how I feel about Jess. She seemed to complain a bit too much about her life for my taste and her friendships with her two celebrity-ish friends seemed a bit too surface level and cliche to me. And I know that "boof" is supposed to be an endearing term she calls one of her friends and has a funny story behind it, but I found it really bothering me every time she used it. I wanted a more likable character who I could click with instead of someone who complained about her life and seemed to have opportunities just dropped into her lap. How many people would really so easily get a personal assistant job with a celebrity when their only experience is as a coffee barista?
As for the pacing, I could have used a more fast paced story in the beginning and not so much jumping around for the rest of the book. It took me awhile to get into the book and when I did and she started to work for the composer Tyler, she all of the sudden starts working for someone else. And then, with her relationship with her mom, I felt like it relied on cliches and didn't really develop into something unique.
Overall, I expected a lot more depth and reality from this book. Also, I wanted so many more references to celebrities that I actually know, instead of brief references of Jess looking at her favorite gossip blogs. More details would have created a much more believable world and connectable story. In the end, while this was a light, entertaining read, it didn't live up to the expectations I had in mind.
As third-generation Hollywood, Jess has felt the pressure from her not-so-present mother to be the star and show their family proud. Pretty early on, though, it was clear that Jess was not destined for fame. When she's fired from her job as a barista because she's not hip or young enough anymore, Jess snags the job as the personal assistant to a Hollywood composer in the world she loves so much. Jess soon finds herself running errands and cooking for the man until her cooking garners the attention of an up-coming actress. Jess dives head first into the celebrity world and realizes it's not all that it's cracked up to be.
The one thing that can make or break a book is the main character. For me, I'm still not so sure how I feel about Jess. She seemed to complain a bit too much about her life for my taste and her friendships with her two celebrity-ish friends seemed a bit too surface level and cliche to me. And I know that "boof" is supposed to be an endearing term she calls one of her friends and has a funny story behind it, but I found it really bothering me every time she used it. I wanted a more likable character who I could click with instead of someone who complained about her life and seemed to have opportunities just dropped into her lap. How many people would really so easily get a personal assistant job with a celebrity when their only experience is as a coffee barista?
As for the pacing, I could have used a more fast paced story in the beginning and not so much jumping around for the rest of the book. It took me awhile to get into the book and when I did and she started to work for the composer Tyler, she all of the sudden starts working for someone else. And then, with her relationship with her mom, I felt like it relied on cliches and didn't really develop into something unique.
Overall, I expected a lot more depth and reality from this book. Also, I wanted so many more references to celebrities that I actually know, instead of brief references of Jess looking at her favorite gossip blogs. More details would have created a much more believable world and connectable story. In the end, while this was a light, entertaining read, it didn't live up to the expectations I had in mind.
April 14, 2015
http://www.anurseandabook.com/2015/04...
I really liked this book. A lot. It's a great debut novel by an author to watch out for, if you like complicated characters living complicated lives.
Jess is kind of a mess. Actually a hot mess. She always seems either completely insecure or wildly overconfident. She quits jobs before she has other jobs lined up. She mouths off to her bosses, sometimes for imaginary slights rather than real ones. Kind of like people I know in real life.
Jess's relationship with her mother is strained at best, totally dysfunctional at worst. Her mother used her childhood to try to continually upgrade their life. But although Jess tries to steer clear of her mother, she mimics the same behaviors in her own life, continually trying to upgrade to the better celebrity, better job, better friends.
The book is a bit disjointed, messy and emotional, but intensely readable. Shanna Mahin is a great new talent.
I really liked this book. A lot. It's a great debut novel by an author to watch out for, if you like complicated characters living complicated lives.
Jess is kind of a mess. Actually a hot mess. She always seems either completely insecure or wildly overconfident. She quits jobs before she has other jobs lined up. She mouths off to her bosses, sometimes for imaginary slights rather than real ones. Kind of like people I know in real life.
Jess's relationship with her mother is strained at best, totally dysfunctional at worst. Her mother used her childhood to try to continually upgrade their life. But although Jess tries to steer clear of her mother, she mimics the same behaviors in her own life, continually trying to upgrade to the better celebrity, better job, better friends.
The book is a bit disjointed, messy and emotional, but intensely readable. Shanna Mahin is a great new talent.
August 23, 2019
Oh You Pretty Things! came with me to a pool day at a Hollywood hotel and I can’t imagine a better setting for devouring this debut novel. I was so engrossed in the spot-on depiction of life in LA that I left the pool with a serious sunburn. This is the best chick lit I’ve read since the Devil Wears Prada in the late-2000s. This is the LA version of that same narrative with all the real-life glamour and darkness lurking just below the surface. Shanna Mahin slays LA all day with a precision and depth. The only thing that held me back from a 5-star review was the ending, which fell flat. The author’s intent was to give the book a real-life Hollywood ending, not a movie script ending, but the end was as abrupt as the infamous finale of The Sopranos. Nonetheless, if you’re looking for a real glimpse into celebrity and life in LA, this is it.
March 12, 2023
Truly one of the worst books I have ever read. I wanted to DNF but I kept telling myself “it has to get better right!?!” Spoiler: it doesn’t
I fail to see any plot line to this novel at all, there were not problems or inciting incidents. The main character is nothing but a spoiled nepo baby and I truly can’t stand how privileged and narcissistic she is
Quite possible the worst book I have ever read
I fail to see any plot line to this novel at all, there were not problems or inciting incidents. The main character is nothing but a spoiled nepo baby and I truly can’t stand how privileged and narcissistic she is
Quite possible the worst book I have ever read
May 19, 2015
Entertaining and un-put-down-able. 2 observations:
1. You'll never go broke writing about rich people behaving badly.
2. Being a personal assistant for a capricious, manipulative star might be good training for parenting a toddler. (the 3 a.m. requests, the ever changing food needs...)
1. You'll never go broke writing about rich people behaving badly.
2. Being a personal assistant for a capricious, manipulative star might be good training for parenting a toddler. (the 3 a.m. requests, the ever changing food needs...)
January 8, 2019
Why did I start reading this? Why did I finish reading this? Why did I do this to myself? What god forced me to read this inane and vapid book?
May 29, 2023
I found this book in a box labeled “free” in the woman’s bathroom on campus. I think I’m going to put it back there.
April 4, 2016
Well, this book was a sensitive and revelatory surprise! What appeared to be an escapist chick lit confection, amidst Hollywood glam, money, spoiled celebs and an outrageously entitled society overall, was no "bon bon". Jesse is twenty-nine, struggling to find her path to something she might have success with in a life entangled by an impossible childhood, narcissistic employers, self-absorbed friends, navel-gazing actors and actresses and her mother, who suddenly shows up. Shanna Mahin scores big points for providing lots of humour featuring the absurd lengths these "stars" go to feed their egos, as well as great tongue in cheek descriptions of Hollywood's very particular and newest food fads which feed celebrity appetites for status as well!
But at its heart, this novel shows how someone like Jesse, scarred by many and unfair "hard knocks", goes from accepting her disjointed life, taken advantage of as she works harder to please those who will never be pleased to the point of epiphany, when she sees how broken things are.
The novel ends at a place of personal strength, yet far from any predictable chick lit formula. The conclusion is unexpected, the book so good as a result - because even though this story takes place in the glam of Hollywood, it also takes places in the reality of everyday human lives.
But at its heart, this novel shows how someone like Jesse, scarred by many and unfair "hard knocks", goes from accepting her disjointed life, taken advantage of as she works harder to please those who will never be pleased to the point of epiphany, when she sees how broken things are.
The novel ends at a place of personal strength, yet far from any predictable chick lit formula. The conclusion is unexpected, the book so good as a result - because even though this story takes place in the glam of Hollywood, it also takes places in the reality of everyday human lives.
March 21, 2015
Goodreads Advance Reader Win
This is a about a third generation Hollywood Jess Dunne who still looking for her star. Living in Santa Monica working as a barista with a roommate who is actually a working actress, she is living from day to day.
Her mom is a failed actress whom she is not close with has suddenly become needy. Jess realizes she needs a better job as she is heading a downward spiral.
Jess finds herself becoming a person assistant and realizes quickly how needy they are and sometimes no amount of money is enough to deal with their demands. We watch her deal with them and how she moves from one agoraphobia person to an actress one who may end up destroying her friendship with her best friend.
Meantime she must deal with her mother who promise of a visit has her trying to avoid her. Her mom has a secret that will change her world. Will they manage to make amends before it is too late?
It is a fast paced story that moves along engrossing the reader as we get a glimpse of the world of Hollywood. All the glitter is not gold and in this case not pretty as well.
This is a about a third generation Hollywood Jess Dunne who still looking for her star. Living in Santa Monica working as a barista with a roommate who is actually a working actress, she is living from day to day.
Her mom is a failed actress whom she is not close with has suddenly become needy. Jess realizes she needs a better job as she is heading a downward spiral.
Jess finds herself becoming a person assistant and realizes quickly how needy they are and sometimes no amount of money is enough to deal with their demands. We watch her deal with them and how she moves from one agoraphobia person to an actress one who may end up destroying her friendship with her best friend.
Meantime she must deal with her mother who promise of a visit has her trying to avoid her. Her mom has a secret that will change her world. Will they manage to make amends before it is too late?
It is a fast paced story that moves along engrossing the reader as we get a glimpse of the world of Hollywood. All the glitter is not gold and in this case not pretty as well.
May 25, 2015
It's always interesting to me when people don't like books because there are no sympathetic characters. I suspect this may fall prey to the same thing, but I enjoyed the train wreck. People are complicated and I thought the book captured that pretty well. The fact that it was funny didn't hurt at all.
May 25, 2015
I liked this enough to finish it in spite of the fact that I found literally nothing likable about the main character, or really any of the characters. But I'm pretty sure I wouldn't rave about it to anyone. Maybe it's an age thing. Maybe I need to understand the self-absorption of the younger set in order to empathize with Jess. In any event ... meh.
July 4, 2015
Perfect vacation read (thanks A). Loved all of the pop culture references, decadent food writing and this line: I let imaginary conversations unspool in my head where I'm witty and poignant and just the right amount of self-effacing.
February 6, 2022
I bought and read this book after hearing Brad Listi's Other ppl podcast with the interview with Shanna Mahin, which, sadly, he'd pulled out of his archives due to her recently passing away. :( Listi's interviews always make me want to read his interviewee's book(s). Some of which end up in me getting my hands on the book as soon as possible, which was the case with this one. It was hard to come by "Oh! You Pretty Things", but I managed to find it via a second hand booksellers on Amazon (I know, and I am sorry...)
So, this book, for me, felt like a nice casual kind of read. Which I personally need every now and again, something lighter in between all the weight. Although, that's not to say some of the subject matter wasn't on the heavy side. But it's a slim book, with short chapters, an easy and easily understandable voice, and it has a page turning feel to it.
We're taken into L.A. and see it through the eyes of a climber on the Hollywood ladder. Jenny, a kitchen genius who becomes personal assistant to a (fictional) famous young actress. Now, this is a scene I've seen much of in T.V. and film. Actually just started watching the L-Word which coincided in a funny way with reading this book. I've not spent much time in L.A. literature, though, so it felt like a new experience.
Mahin creates a picture of L.A., its people and their lifestyles in a realistic and captivating way. I was hanging on to her every word and found it all quite fascinating. There's some heavy stuff on sexual abuse in there, giving us a glimpse at the dark side of Hollywood. There's the rich and famous and those who cater to the rich and famous, our main character being one of the latter. Both L.A.'s ugliness and prettiness is shown to us in their true colours through a critical but besotted protagonist. Mahin pulled me in and while my head was stuck in the book I felt like I was there in L.A. too. Love and destruction.
The plot is simple, but it feels logical in what the author (I feel) wants to show us, and the book felt neatly rounded off. It felt like a snippet in the life of the main character. It felt like a touch of the surface. I think it was meant to feel like that, as I think that's what L.A. feels like. We see the real and the not so real, but we never really get to see the true nitty gritty details. A deeper dive into the protagonist's psyche and what happened to her may have been what we wanted more of... But isn't that the point of the book? We want to know more... The whole time we're just waiting to find out more... But that's Hollywood... We'll never know the full story.
So, this book, for me, felt like a nice casual kind of read. Which I personally need every now and again, something lighter in between all the weight. Although, that's not to say some of the subject matter wasn't on the heavy side. But it's a slim book, with short chapters, an easy and easily understandable voice, and it has a page turning feel to it.
We're taken into L.A. and see it through the eyes of a climber on the Hollywood ladder. Jenny, a kitchen genius who becomes personal assistant to a (fictional) famous young actress. Now, this is a scene I've seen much of in T.V. and film. Actually just started watching the L-Word which coincided in a funny way with reading this book. I've not spent much time in L.A. literature, though, so it felt like a new experience.
Mahin creates a picture of L.A., its people and their lifestyles in a realistic and captivating way. I was hanging on to her every word and found it all quite fascinating. There's some heavy stuff on sexual abuse in there, giving us a glimpse at the dark side of Hollywood. There's the rich and famous and those who cater to the rich and famous, our main character being one of the latter. Both L.A.'s ugliness and prettiness is shown to us in their true colours through a critical but besotted protagonist. Mahin pulled me in and while my head was stuck in the book I felt like I was there in L.A. too. Love and destruction.
The plot is simple, but it feels logical in what the author (I feel) wants to show us, and the book felt neatly rounded off. It felt like a snippet in the life of the main character. It felt like a touch of the surface. I think it was meant to feel like that, as I think that's what L.A. feels like. We see the real and the not so real, but we never really get to see the true nitty gritty details. A deeper dive into the protagonist's psyche and what happened to her may have been what we wanted more of... But isn't that the point of the book? We want to know more... The whole time we're just waiting to find out more... But that's Hollywood... We'll never know the full story.
June 15, 2021
This is one of those fun, breezy novels with an edgy, observant narrator. Of course she’s single, struggling and snarky, in the best way. The affluent celebrity world of Los Angeles is a main character, and the realm Jess strives to inhabit. Initially car-less, aging out of a low wage gig and sharing a rent controlled flat near Venice Beach, Jess is an aspiring "fish out of water" who knows the landscape like a pro. Though she failed her ambitious mother who tried to coach an awkward girl into a child star, Jess succeeds as a personal assistant willing to go the extra mile (even in traffic), is talented in the kitchen and a great friend.
Naturally, a personal assistant’s life, ruled by the fickle whims of a television star, comes with plenty of stress, interrupted romance and bouts of insecurity. Jess is completely relatable and I rooted for her as she avoided her delusional mother, envied her best friend’s famous boyfriend, and sweated through make-or-break catering gigs. Her vulnerability goes deep, and belies her occasionally caustic defenses.
I initially knew Shanna Mahin’s writing from Dime Stories, an open mic where her honesty and humor frequently slayed the crowd. Somehow I missed the fact she’d published a novel five years ago, which says a lot about how self-effacing she could be. Sadly, she recently passed, so reading Oh! You Pretty Things was bittersweet on a personal level. I almost hoped I wouldn’t like it, but it’s effing great, smart, funny and a kicky gift to have left behind. I hope it finds lots of readers looking for a memorable glimpse of Hollywood life and a rough-and-tumble narrator they can cheer for.
Naturally, a personal assistant’s life, ruled by the fickle whims of a television star, comes with plenty of stress, interrupted romance and bouts of insecurity. Jess is completely relatable and I rooted for her as she avoided her delusional mother, envied her best friend’s famous boyfriend, and sweated through make-or-break catering gigs. Her vulnerability goes deep, and belies her occasionally caustic defenses.
I initially knew Shanna Mahin’s writing from Dime Stories, an open mic where her honesty and humor frequently slayed the crowd. Somehow I missed the fact she’d published a novel five years ago, which says a lot about how self-effacing she could be. Sadly, she recently passed, so reading Oh! You Pretty Things was bittersweet on a personal level. I almost hoped I wouldn’t like it, but it’s effing great, smart, funny and a kicky gift to have left behind. I hope it finds lots of readers looking for a memorable glimpse of Hollywood life and a rough-and-tumble narrator they can cheer for.
September 16, 2020
If you regard Hollywood with equal parts fascination and disdain you might get a kick out of this book. I certainly did. It was snarky, fast paced, and fun, but also touched on some heavy, heart-wrenching issues. The author is incredibly funny in a self-deprecating way I really appreciate as of late, and I devoured it in a matter of days.
December 9, 2025
you know how people say that you either love or hate a main character? yeah i'm pretty sure i don't love her
May 26, 2015
I raced through this book, so clearly it resonated at some level, but it was hard in some parts to get through the main character's snarkiness and neediness to figure out what the heck the story really was about.
See Jess, our messed-up, sarcastic heroine, is divorced, just past her fetching twenties, with a dysfunctional distant mother, and just barely hanging on to her on-the-far-reaches-of-celebrity lifestyle in Santa Monica, as a barista sharing a slummy apartment with a working actress - her friend, Megan. Jess lucks into a job as a personal assistant to an agoraphobic composer, who sends her out for increasingly ridiculous errands, and seems to have no life...but this first PA experience, in addition to Jess's amazing cooking skills and a strange girlfriend named Scottie, lead to her next gig as the PA to a real rising star, the actress Eva Carleton.
It's amazing how Eva's name opens any door, and while working for Eva is like a dream come true, at first, life quickly turns surreal for Jess. Her wacky mother is in town with a sob story, Megan goes off in a love-blissed haze to live with her new actor love, J.J., and Eva's requests become increasingly bizarre...plus there are all Eva's secrets to keep and people to manipulate. We find out about Jess's back story as time passes, and you start to wonder why she would talk to her mother at all after the childhood she had...
I stayed to find out what happened, almost like watching a train wreck: you know it's not going anywhere good, but you can't look away. Would have been another star, but all the detail and the snippy dialogue was off-putting. Recommended for chick lit fans, and celebrity-obsessed stalkers wanting to know how Hollywood works behind the scenes.
See Jess, our messed-up, sarcastic heroine, is divorced, just past her fetching twenties, with a dysfunctional distant mother, and just barely hanging on to her on-the-far-reaches-of-celebrity lifestyle in Santa Monica, as a barista sharing a slummy apartment with a working actress - her friend, Megan. Jess lucks into a job as a personal assistant to an agoraphobic composer, who sends her out for increasingly ridiculous errands, and seems to have no life...but this first PA experience, in addition to Jess's amazing cooking skills and a strange girlfriend named Scottie, lead to her next gig as the PA to a real rising star, the actress Eva Carleton.
It's amazing how Eva's name opens any door, and while working for Eva is like a dream come true, at first, life quickly turns surreal for Jess. Her wacky mother is in town with a sob story, Megan goes off in a love-blissed haze to live with her new actor love, J.J., and Eva's requests become increasingly bizarre...plus there are all Eva's secrets to keep and people to manipulate. We find out about Jess's back story as time passes, and you start to wonder why she would talk to her mother at all after the childhood she had...
I stayed to find out what happened, almost like watching a train wreck: you know it's not going anywhere good, but you can't look away. Would have been another star, but all the detail and the snippy dialogue was off-putting. Recommended for chick lit fans, and celebrity-obsessed stalkers wanting to know how Hollywood works behind the scenes.
May 6, 2015
If you're a closet People or Us reader you will go particularly wild for this book as you try to identify who the Hollywood stars in this book might really be. Don't bother trying, just enjoy this wonderful first novel by Shanna Mahin.
Haven't you ever wondered what it would be like to partake of the glamour life as a PA (Personal Assistant) to the bold face names in the newspaper? Jess Dunne, tarnished by her upbringing by a heartless mother, tries to make a life in the movie capital by working as first a barista, then a PA to an Oscar winning composer and then to a movie and soap opera star. Some of Jess' experiences will make you cringe.
But though you will hurt with Jess, but you will also laugh uproariously at her humor. Mahin is such a wonderful writer that it is hard to believe she dropped out of high school. Whatever formed her talent, embrace it and pray she'll write more...soon.
One disappointing note. Donna, Jess' mother, just doesn't manage to come together as a real person, although I feel she must have been, perhaps Mahin's own.
Haven't you ever wondered what it would be like to partake of the glamour life as a PA (Personal Assistant) to the bold face names in the newspaper? Jess Dunne, tarnished by her upbringing by a heartless mother, tries to make a life in the movie capital by working as first a barista, then a PA to an Oscar winning composer and then to a movie and soap opera star. Some of Jess' experiences will make you cringe.
But though you will hurt with Jess, but you will also laugh uproariously at her humor. Mahin is such a wonderful writer that it is hard to believe she dropped out of high school. Whatever formed her talent, embrace it and pray she'll write more...soon.
One disappointing note. Donna, Jess' mother, just doesn't manage to come together as a real person, although I feel she must have been, perhaps Mahin's own.
June 11, 2015
so.... hmm. the author includes a fairly interesting acknowledgments section at the back of this novel. as i was reading her personal commentary, i kept thinking her real life story (which seems to be slightly woven into O!YPT) would make for an excellent memoir (along the lines of Let's Pretend This Never Happened: A Mostly True Memoir), and probably be a better read that Oh! You Pretty Things. (sorry!) while there is definitely entertainment value to mahin's book, i didn't find it very original. it also felt a bit simplistic and clichéd. anyway, it's a quick read. i was left feeling like mahin has great potential, but missed some opportunities in her debut novel. for many, this will be worth your consideration for vacation or summer reading.
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