Arts & Entertainments

July 14, 2014
Unsuccessful New York actor "Handsome" Eddie Hartley, now a drama teacher, and his wife, Susan, are caught in financial turmoil in their attempt to have a baby. Doctor visits pile up, and to make some extra cash, Eddie secretly sells an old sex tape, featuring a former flame, the now famous Martha Martin. But Eddie's quiet life explodes after the tape is quickly traced back to him. In the swirl of sudden media interest, Susan, feeling betrayed and now pregnant with triplets, throws her husband out and uses the newfound attention to become the star of her own well-received reality television series. And as Eddie tries to win his wife back from the sidelines, he also claws into the limelight: staging a fling with a 19-year-old, signing his life away to a smarmy reality TV producer, and living his life in front of a camera. The second novel from Beha (What Happened to Sophie Wilder) is filled with unpleasant, shallow characters, and though affability isn't required for narrative success, the author never lands enough imperative moments to craft a remarkable story. While occasionally funny, Eddie's reality TV exploits often translate as dated, a behind-the-scenes expose of an entertainment trend already long in the tooth, and as he stumbles through the stardom that eluded him for so long, the satire flounders.

June 15, 2014
A man desperate for cash makes a deal with the reality TV devil in this thoughtful, occasionally lecturing second novel from Harper's deputy editor Beha (What Happened to Sophie Wilder, 2012, etc.).Eddie is an erstwhile actor who's given up on the occasional Law & Order gig to teach at the tony New York City Catholic boys school he attended. The job doesn't pay enough to cover the in vitro fertilization treatments he and his wife, Susan, have signed on for, but a friend of a friend suggests a way to make some quick money: Sell the footage he recorded of himself with his ex-girlfriend Martha, now a red-hot actress. The sex tape boosts his bank account but botches everything else: Susan kicks him out of their apartment, he's fired from the school, and the tabloids turn "Handsome Eddie" into an object of ridicule. Eddie is desperate to right himself morally and reconnect with Susan, especially since the IVF treatment worked, but he's no longer in charge of his own story: A reality TV producer has made Susan the star of a show about her pregnancy, and Eddie can only enter the picture when the narrative is appropriate for his redemption. This is the stuff of comedy, but Beha gives it a sober-sided treatment; he's concerned with the ways mass media hijack our sense of free will to the point where we only play-act at emotions and live vicariously through celebrities. That theme is old news, and Beha's scenes about viral popularity and entertainment-TV news cycles are familiar and didactic. But the storytelling is ingenious. As Eddie becomes increasingly stage-managed to appear more "authentic," Beha infuses the story with rich, potent irony, suggesting how susceptible we are to others' plotting.Beha gets to have it both ways: His novel is at once brisk and episodic while critiquing the limits of brisk, episodic narrative.

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September 1, 2014

Eddie has a problem. His wife, Susan, is desperate to get pregnant, which requires a fertility clinic, which requires money, which Eddie doesn't have. What failed actor Eddie does have is an explicit sex tape of his ex-live-in girlfriend, now a wildly popular TV star. Eddie sells the tape for $100,000, and soon it is everywhere, Susan is pregnant (triplets), the source of the tape is discovered, and Eddie is out of his teaching job. Susan evicts her husband with high drama, resulting in the celeb-talk circuit, her own reality show, and being romanced by film star Rex Gilbert. Eddie, not to be left out, calls a 19 year old he met, and soon their "affair" is on reality TV, too. Beha (What Happened to Sophie Wilder) offers both a send-up and a spot-on representation of unreal reality and our celebrity-worshipping culture. Take this: a woman one day throwing eggs at villain Eddie in the street shows up later, differently clad and made up, as his fake girlfriend's fake mother. And you thought reality TV wasn't arced and scripted? VERDICT Pop culture fans who can survive a slow, talky first chapter are in for a fun ride.--Robert E. Brown, Oswego, NY

Copyright 2014 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

July 1, 2014
Failed actor Eddie Hartley is back at the elite prep school he once attended, teaching drama. His ex-girlfriend Martha is now living the dream they once shared, pulling down major bucks as the star of the TV show Dr. Drake. Meanwhile, Eddie and his wife are mired in debt as the result of a failed in vitro attempt. That's when he gets the idea to sell an old sex tape he made with Martha, convincing himself that the money will pay for fertility treatments (as well as delivering payback for the excruciating way she dumped him). This rash act garners him the fame he always wanted: he is soon being stalked by the paparazzi; he's fired from his job; his wife throws him out; and she becomes the star of a reality-TV program casting Eddie as the villain. The ingenious way he plots to get back into his wife's good graces provides lots of laughs in this very clever takedown of celebrity culture. Beha, deputy editor at Harper's magazine, also gives his hapless hero plenty of heart in a novel that is both entertaining and thought provoking.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)