I've been a huge fan of the gofugyourself site for about 4 years now- I love Heather and Jessica's fashion commentary. It's always sharp, witty, and just biting enough to not be too bitchy. They're great at it, and I bought Spoiled because of my adoration of their fug work.
Spoiled was not, however, as great as I had hoped it would be. The book has a stack of brilliant one-liners, and very amusing asides that poke fun at how silly/shallow some of the characters are, but writing like that is not enough to sustain a novel. The dialogue is not great, mainly because it is not believable, and I don't mean that in a 'suspension of disbelief' way. It is also delivered way too fast, without appropriate context. For example, when Laurel is telling Molly about who her father is (sorry, trying to avoid getting deleted for spoilers!), the dialogue is almost akin to a throw-away line. This leaves what is actually a big deal in Molly's life falling kind of flat for the reader. Plus, repeatedly throughout the book there is a dearth of really good scene-setting. It's not something that requires paragraphs of descriptions, just a clever snappy line or two can provide more than enough for the reader to envisage what is going on. It's almost like they were trying to get to the next funny comment/line too fast to enable the reader to actually engage with the characters.
Spoiled left me feeling a bit unsatisfied. Sure, I laughed, but a novel needs to do more than that. I can just read their website if I want a few laughs. A novel's purpose is the story it's trying to tell. A novel should deliver its story in a way that makes you feel like you were along for the ride, no matter how light-hearted the subject matter is.
