Starr Bright Will Be with You Soon [Paperback]

Rosamond Smith (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 28, 2000

Lily Merrick is overjoyed at the return of her twin sister after a fifteenyear separation, unaware that the prodigal sibling has left a trail of male corpses in sleazy hotel rooms all over the country. By the author of Double Delight. Reprint.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

In Haunted: Tales of the Grotesque, Joyce Carol Oates astutely captures "the interior haunting of a human being by their ever-shifting sense of self." This fascination with identity, secret selves, and our private inner landscapes shapes many of Oates's works, and she even assumes her own other self when she writes as Rosamond Smith. This pseudonym allows Oates to escape into the world of the thriller, where the psychologically disturbed mind can still find a home.

Smith's seventh novel, Starr Bright Will Be with You Soon, is the story of identical twins, who have lived remarkably different lives. Sharon Donner (a.k.a. Starr Bright) is a Las Vegas stripper--and oh, yes, one of the most deadly female serial killers to have walked our planet. On the other end of the spectrum is her sister, Lily Merrick. As this demure-sounding name might suggest, Lily is an all-around good girl, housewife, and mother, who is completely unaware of her twin's murderous streak. Estranged for many years, Sharon decides it's time to pay her do-gooder of a doppelganger a visit, and makes her way to upstate New York. Of course, this won't be a cozy, Oprah Winfrey kind of reunion. Sharon's ugly past soon catches up with her, and thereby drags her twin into the very dangerous present. --Naomi Gesinger --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Updating the classic good twin/bad twin scenario, Smith (aka Joyce Carol Oates; Double Delight, LJ 3/15/97) adds a 1990s twist. Sharon is a successful fashion model with a difference: she's become a serial killer. After her first two murders, described in graphic detail, we meet her sister, Lily, and Lily's family. Sharon hasn't seen her sister for years, but she needs a place to hide, and her decision to hide out with Lily uncovers deep psychological wounds. Sharon, the attractive and successful sister, has always forced Lily into the background. Now she threatens to do it again as Lily's husband and daughter become infatuated with Aunt Sharon. The resulting psychological portrait is a real page-turner that concludes with an ominous last chapter. Some of the descriptions are quite graphic, but with that in mind, this is a good choice for libraries.
-?Joshua Cohen, Mid-Hudson Lib. System, Poughkeepsie, NY
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 264 pages
• Publisher: Plume; Reprint edition (February 28, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0452280354
• ISBN-13: 978-0452280359
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,498,860 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A riveting tale of murder, April 14, 2000

By 

N. Donohoe (Glenview, IL USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Starr Bright Will Be with You Soon (Hardcover)

Starr Bright... is one of Joyce Carol Oates' shorter novels. This prolific writer, who penned this thriller under the name of Rosamund Smith, has once again succeeded in keeping the reader in constant suspense, even though we know who the killer is from page one. It is the killer's fate - as opposed to those of her victims - that we are so anxious to learn about. I recently attended a reading and book signing by JCO which was held at Robert Morris College in Chicago. She also spent considerable time in a question and answer session with RMC honors English students who read two of her novels for their class. She is a very fragile looking individual who intrigues everyone with her command of the story, the characters and the direction each piece of work takes. An extremely prolific writer, she has written poetry, plays and critical articles for numerous publications - in addition to over 60 novels and her work as a professor at Princeton University. She did not elaborate about the pseudonym she has frequently used - only that she wishes she had chosen another name. Because Starr Bright... is a shorter work, one does wonder if she has relegated certain efforts to Rosamund to distance them from Joyce Carol Oates. While I was thoroughly engrossed by Starr Bright - and it does utilize one of JCO's favorite underlying themes of twins - I felt I needed more at the end. We are fairly certain of the killer's fate, but what of her twin sister? The far-reaching effects of the murders to her family and community would, no doubt, be devastating. Perhaps it is fodder for another novel or perhaps tying up loose ends into neat little conclusions is not in the JCO style. Also, Oates does not hold back in the gruesome details of each attack - not necessarily a criticism, just a point of fact. Oates has just completed another novel (she writes constantly) and this one is a 1400 page opus titled Blonde, inspired by the life of Marilyn Monroe. She says she was moved to write it when she saw a photo of the pretty, fresh-looking and former Norma Jean - before the blonde hair, sexy clothing and voluptuous attitude she had perfected toward the camera. Seems like an interesting turn for JCO and her fans.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Creepy..., May 13, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Starr Bright Will Be with You Soon (Hardcover)

The book was riveting; I couldn't put it down. I couldn't help wondering, though, how "Starr Bright" never met ONE decent man her whole life? She was with dozens, maybe a hundred men, and never once met a good one?

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A good read, March 31, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Starr Bright Will Be with You Soon (Hardcover)

In her late thirties, Sharon Donnor's career as a Vegas exotic dancer seems to be coming to an end. However, her other life as Starr Bright appears to be rising in proportion. Each night Starr Bright seeks a person who loves and cares for her. Invariably, the lowlifes she chooses fail her, forcing her to kill them. The city panics as she leaves on her victims a satanic star painted in the dead person's blood.

When the heat picks up, Sharon returns to her family home in New York. There her twin sister takes her into the heart of her own family, not knowing what festers underneath the surface of her sister. Starr Bright quickly resurfaces as she begins a campaign of vengeance to destroy those who hurt her over two decades ago.

STARR BRIGHT WILL BE WITH YOU SOON is a well-written thriller that adds nothing new to the long history of good and evil twins. The story line appears eerie and psychologically spooky while the twins are interesting mirror images of one another. However, except for the fact Rosamund Smith turns out to be a pseudonym of Joyce Carol Oates, this book feels like deja vu. This is not necessarily bad, it has just been done before and by the same author.

Harriet Klausner 3/6/99