MESSY

Sisters Brooke (budding Tinseltown diva) and Molly (level-headed Midwesterner) return, along with Brick Berlin, their self-absorbed, dimly sweet megastar dad, in a companion piece to Spoiled (2011), gleefully sending up celebrity blogs and social networking.

Molly’s friend, budding writer Max McCormack, lives “in a Fendi world on a Forever 21 budget.” Brainiac Max and savvy über-shopper Brooke share little beyond dim views of fashion crimes and cultural misdemeanors. Nevertheless, cash-strapped Max—her mother is the headmistress of a tony private school catering to celebrity spawn; her dad’s unemployed—can’t resist a high-paying job secretly ghostwriting Brooke’s new blog (part career strategy, part bid for parental attention). As blog success brings Brooke a starring role in a drastically re-envisioned Nancy Drew movie, Max increasingly resents her own invisibility—and especially Brooke’s rapport with her co-star and major blog fan. Satirizing Hollywood is a time-honored literary pastime, but timely satirical touches keep things fresh, from Brick’s latest film, Avalanche! (shot in Florida), to the vegetarian restaurant (Fu’d) where Max reluctantly serves toham and notwurst.

For most of the lowlife celebrities skewered, fame will be justly fleeting, but this novel should have a longer shelf life, thanks to a cast of complex characters who offer ample evidence that, F. Scott Fitzgerald notwithstanding, the rich and famous are like you and me.