I recently had a bunch of books become available from holds at the library, one of them being the somewhat heavy (but also, in retrospect, somewhat uplifting) When Breath Becomes Air, my reading challenge book for the "book about death or grief" category. Knowing that was coming up, I knew I was going to need some pure fluff to balance a deeply introspective memoir about dying and the meaning of life. You know, all that fun stuff. And then up popped #Starstruck. I haven't read any of Sariah Wilson's works before, but I've had Royal Date by her sitting on my Kindle for ages. Still, #Starstruck caught my eye. There's something intriguing about celebrity romances, and since I had such a great experience with Idol last year (though that celebrity was a rockstar, not an actor) I thought I'd give this a go.Heroine and narrator Zoe adores Chase Covington, an obsession she picked up in order to bond with her now-best friend, Lexi, when they were children. Because Zoe didn't have friends and Lexi said that if they both liked Chase Covington (and Lexi loves Chase Covington), then they could be friends. And so when a Twitter exchange leads to Zoe eventually meeting and then becoming involved with Chase, she is starstruck indeed.
Was this the strongest celebrity romance book I've read? No. Something about it just seems to ring false, like how these people would ever actually meet, how fast they fell for each other, etc. For example, this book takes insta-love to a new level, in which the two characters love each other from before they even lay eyes on each other, just from a series of 140-character Tweets over the course of like, three days. However, there were a lot of elements I really liked here. Let's talk about a few.
First, despite Zoe's self-proclaimed "obsession" with Chase, she is not really obsessed with him. She's a fan, definitely, but she does not do anything crazy. Lexi is the one who makes Chase scrapbooks, who stalks his manager to get close to him, who would reportedly do anything to be with him. Despite Zoe saying how much she "loves" Chase even before they meet, she seems remarkably sane and her priorities always lay elsewhere. The "obsession" is really more just going along with Lexi. This was good, because Chase falling for a stalker would have been, uhm, weird to the extreme.
Zoe as a character is actually great in general. Her family is important to her. While she's attracted to Chase, she's also keenly aware of how fame can bite back, and so remains wary of their relationship. Additionally, Zoe is abstinent, and it's not because of religion. Whaaat? Yes. This is great to see--not because I'm anti-sex in romances (hey, if you can write a good sex scene, go for it) but because it suits her character and background. But Wilson has an abstinent-by-choice character who also doesn't feel the need to bash you over the head with religion every two seconds, which is so refreshing. While waiting for a committed relationship to have sex isn't strange at all, for some reason in fiction, it's always because of religion and not just because it's a personal choice. Consequently, this was refreshing. But never fear! Wilson can write a sizzling attraction and some delicious scenes of kissing and making out without anyone's clothes coming off. The one thing that bugged me was that, though Chase told Zoe how the media would spin things and that he'd tell her what she wanted regarding what was actually happening, she just freaked out at him whenever something happened. I understand jealousy and insecurity, but she really seemed to take it to an extreme.
Chase was harder to get a handle on. This is probably because he's not the narrator, and consequently we can't really get inside his head. We only have what he says, and while Zoe believes him, she also has doubts from time to time, and those spill over to the reader. But at the end of the book, I was left with this key question: Why did Chase go out with Zoe? Once they were together, it's easy to see and understand why they would keep it up. I don't have any issues with that. But I have trouble believing that, upon re-entering the dating world, Chase and everyone around him would decide that Zoe was "the one" based on literally a single Tweet, which only said that she didn't think his most recent movie was his best.
Overall, I liked this. It was a fast read, the two characters had a lot of chemistry even if they never, ahem, got down to business, and I liked Zoe as a main character. But I never felt like the actual meeting and initial connection rang true. But hey, Wilson can write a really good kissing scene!
4 stars out of 5.
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