Chase Garnett’s life is changed forever the day he auditions for televised singing competition Name in Stars. Because not only is he thrown into boyband Level Zero and propelled to the dizzying heights of popstar superstardom, he’s also thrown directly into the path of Tripp Harrison, his charismatic and unpredictable bandmate. All fringe-flicks, skinny jeans and Oscar Wilde quotes, Chase falls for Tripp hard, but with an ever-expanding fan base to please and a management team desperate to please them, the boys are forced to hide their burgeoning relationship for fear it will harm Level Zero’s skyrocketing success. After all, teenage girls will spend more money on a perpetually available, strictly heterosexual boyband.
Splendid story. Impossible don't be a fan of Level Zero. This story is so beautifully told, it has wonderful scenes like the coming out of Chase to his family, Tripp playing with his doll and singing "Barbie Girl". We can fell that the author is a poet either. This book ia totally movie material (hello, Netflix?).
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
As a first novel, with only 5 reviews on Amazon, and no author bio, I could have easily skipped over this little story of the pressures of first love under the celebrity spotlight for two UK boy band members. But a 5-star review from a self-admitted snark, who is otherwise hard-to-please, had me stopping to take a closer look. The kitchen scene in which the MC comes out to his mother is both sweet and refreshing.
Sure there are problems with editing ("blonde" boys, speaking with "cockney twinge," and raising a "furore") and formatting (YELLING IN ALL CAPS), but all of that can be overlooked once the desire to follow the narrative takes over in the first few chapters. The blather that passes for entertainment news could have been pared and access to more of Chase's inner turmoil and reflections would have deepened the connection for readers, but it still had quite a bit to offer.
The pressures and expectations the young MCs had to juggle were handled well enough and the colorful cast of parents, siblings, and rival band members helped define the layers of tension between the public and private lives of the performers. Well done, Gregson, and what's next?