Customer Reviews

The Year of Living Famously

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

"The year of Living Famously" is a year in the life of an up and coming fashion designer and the struggling actor she marries, whose star rises and threatens their marriage due to media exposure and obsessive fans. The book is cleverly written as a tell-all autobiography from the wife's point of view.

Kyra Felis is a native New Yorker and would-be fashion designer whose chance meeting of struggling Irish actor, Declan McKenna, in a Las Vegas casino results in tabloid fodder of an affair (he is currently linked to his piranha-like leading lady, Lauren). After sending an apologetic e-mail to Kyra, he mentions that he will be in New York for location shooting and would like to get together. They meet and immediately fall in love, and she is suddenly moving to LA to marry him.

They manage to have a small amount of time to enjoy each other until an independent film he starred in a few years earlier is released to great press, and he becomes an "overnight" sensation. This causes tremendous strain on their marriage, as she is suddenly thrust into the media spotlight and is followed by paparazzi and forced to contend with her husband's PR machine.

They are forced to move from their beloved apartment on the beach to a fortress in the Hollywood Hills. Suddenly she does not know who she can trust; who is a friend and who is a hanger on? Meanwhile, her star as a fashion designer rises, but she secretly wonders if she is merely riding on the coattails of her famous husband.

Eventually Lauren re-appears and wants Declan back. While Kyra knows in her heart that all those stories romantically linking Declan and Lauren in the press are fabrications, the relationship is slowly put through the wringer until she finally decides that she has had enough and flees back to New York. Will Declan choose fame over love? Lauren over Kyra? Will Kyra and Declan settle their differences and realize they were meant to be together?

Not up until the last page does the reader know the outcome of this witty tell all. Highly recommended - I managed to finish it in two days.

Struggling fashion designer Kyra marries struggling actor Dec, who hits it very, very big with his first major movie, catapulting them into a life of constant scrutiny by legitimate and paparazzi media. Her career also takes off, causing the blare of publicity to include her as well, much to her great misery. In this journal/diary of their first year together, Kyra wonders if a marriage can survive fame and learns it's hard to find someone to trust.

Several years ago I worked as the media spokesperson for a very, very famous person and found myself thrust into the spotlight more than I had imagined, and I hated it. Caldwell describes perfectly what it's like to feel one's privacy invaded and to be the subject of often outrageous gossip.

As I once told a reporter, "Rich is good; famous isn't."

Although the plot twists are quite predictable, Caldwell has a fresh and funny writing style. A good, if quick, read.

This book is well-written and an enjoyable read. The characters are interesting and made me want to keep reading in order to find out what happened to them. The only negatives are that the so-famous-so-fast aspects of the plot are a bit hard to swallow and the constant oh-poor-me attitude of the heroine, who just coincidently gets the career of her dreams as a side benefit of her marriage, does get tiresome at times.

I have gotten extremely skeptical of "chick lit". There is just so much "garbage" out there, written in the name of chick lit.

However, this book is NOT one of them.

Our main character meets up with a guy, they fall in love and get married. During all of this, the guy gets movie star famous. This story tells us of the struggles of living in that world - from the side of the non-celebrity (the wife).

Although I found Jody to be a little annoying at times (speak up for yourself kiddo!), overall the story was told with intelligence and charm.

We actually do get an "inside" peek at just how difficult it must be when you are the *insivisble* wife of a celebrity.

This book is utterly charming and is definitely a notch above many of the chick lit books written today.

Laura Caldwell's "The Year of Living Famously," centered around Kyra, a struggling fashion designer who fell in love with Declan, an actor in Las Vegas. Soon, Kyra was moving from Manhattan to L.A. to be with him. Despite the fact that they were not well off financially, they were in love and living happily. Things changed when Declan's movie on World War II was released and became a blockbuster hit. Soon, their lives were transformed and they were getting Hollywood A-list treatment everywhere they went. However, Kyra soon learned that their popularity came with a price; constant stalking by the paparazzis and fans, intrusions into their private lives, and basically they became public properties. Soon, Kyra began to question if this was worth it.

I have enjoyed Laura Caldwell's previous two books, "The Burning Map," and "A Clean Slate,' and had high expectation of this book. "The Year of Living Famously," is well-written; the characters are well described, it's fast-paced and it provides an insight look into the life of the rich and famous. However, I feel that book is not as engaging as her previous two and that there were not many secondary characters development. Despite that, it's still a great read and better than average chick-lit! I am looking forward to Laura Caldwell's next book.

I loved this book. The two main characters were realistic, witty and yet they still had problems like the rest of us. It strongly tested the boundaries of two people who are in love. This author is one of my favorites and her books are always very good. Kyra, the main character, was very strong because she had to put up with her husband's paparazzi, rumors of his cheating, and more, yet she never was less than tough. Great read.

A fun book to read that won't take up hours of your time or leave you emotionally drained. You can put it down for days and pick up again without missing a beat. It is a sweet story with an unpredictable outcome. Very unlike most sappy love stories out there. The main character is a person a vast majority of women can relate to, someone who loves with all her heart but cant make a decision on where her heart truly blongs. It will never be the best book you ever read, but you will not be disapointed.

I've been waiting for a book like this for years. I'm a huge celebrity fanatic. I read all the magazines like US Weekly and I love E! and other celebrity programs and channels. Laura Caldwell writes so beautifully and truthfully about the upside and downside of fame. The book seemed so realistic it almost made me wonder if Laura was really using a pen name. Is this not Cameron Diaz or someone secretly revealing all about fame? Of course it's not. We all know Laura Caldwell has written lots of other books. But this is so truthful it kinda makes you wonder.

This book isn't like most other chicklit, there are no laugh out loud scenes or satirical looks at Hollywood life. It looks at how life in the spotlight isn't all it's cracked up to be, and can almost be too serious at times when the subject matter (a woman dropped into Hollywood and forced to deal) could have made fun of la-la land instead of painting it as such a distasteful place. Caldwell's writing is wonderful, and I really loved Kyra's relationship with Emmie, the woman who's taken care of her and become a mother figure. The variety of characters, from opportunistic female stars to the best friend back home, make this story enjoyable.

If the "passion" you crave in a book consists of sweaty sex scenes and panted dialogue, don't bother with this one. Kyra and Declan's love story is told without rampant anatomical descriptions and trite declarations of desire; yet I found myself fervently wishing for a day in Kyra's pink flower-toed sandals so I could gaze into her Irishman's golden eyes and hear him say "Love, I'd follow you anywhere." This is one of those books that leaves you aching to know more after you finish the last page. Well done, Ms. Caldwell! One of Red Dress Ink's best.