Disclaimer: I was given a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. 

I loved the first book in the series, and I had high hopes for Celebromancy, but after getting 30% book I finally gave up. I couldn’t get into the story, the premise was off putting for me, and it didn’t feel like Ree had really developed or grown since the first book. In fact, in some ways it felt like she’d back peddled, or was a lot younger than she is, like an inexperienced kid. She made a lot of rather obviously bad choices that didn’t seem to steam from who she was as a person, but rather to service the plot of the story. Ree isn’t dumb, especially not so after the events of the first book, and yet she stumbles into bear traps left and right like a high heeled damsel in a horror movie. 

I tried to hang on, out of my love for the world and character, but I just couldn’t. 

I thought about keeping count of all the female characters who are evil, shallow, bitchy, petty, weak, idiots, or some other degrading stereotype of women, but just thinking about it was depressing me.

It'd be nice to have just one woman other than Ree who isn't a two dimensional caricature of one of "those girls." As it is, I think Ree is suffering from a serious case of the Better Girl trope. :(

Okay, we've just been told that Ree is a "queer," and she's having a "common queer girl problem" of not knowing when another woman is hitting on her.

"If it's too much, you can always go home." Jane winked, then leaned over to adjust the strap on her show, giving Ree just a bit of a look down the star's shirt.

How old is Ree and what kind of lack of experience with women does she have that she doesn't know when another woman is hitting on her? 

Also, what kind of gross, friend zone level of misinformation is this shit, where you catch a woman at an angle where you can see down her shirt is characterized as her flirting or hitting on you? 

Seriously, I hang out with women who fuck other women (lesbians, bisexuals, pansexuals and queer, etc) and I don't suddenly take a wink or even a hug to mean they're going to spread their legs for me. When I see a straight man's ass crack I don't think "is he hitting on me?"

Yes, women can be more subtle in how they flirt, but as a woman I don't jump to these kind of conclusions based on the behavior Jane has exhibited so far. If anything I would think about how much I like her, and how I should or could delicately brooch the subject of telling her how I feel without freaking her out. 

I'm sure that I'm supposed to interpret all this to mean that Ree is utterly inept when it comes to flirting/dating other women, but it very a weird to me that a woman would make these dramatic assumptions about what seems to be another woman's very benign behavior. I mean, most women have experienced situations where their casual, or friendly behavior was been misinterpreted to mean more. Or even been accused of putting male friends into the "friend zone" in similar situations. So, why doesn't Ree think of that? Instead of just being vaguely unsure.

This is the difference between a distinct female characterization and presenting a male narrative perspective as female. Sexual and social dynamics between women are very different than the ones between men and women. Not to mention, the presentation of this situation is extremely problematic in the way it feeds into rape culture stereotypes.

It's skeeving me out.

I'm starting to worry about this book. It's been super slow starting out, plus it's hitting some of my buttons. And not in a good way.

It annoys me that Ree's sexuality is implied, but not explained. Not even in a vague "I don't like labels, but I fuck people no matter their gender" kind of way, which I'd be fine with. Ree just goes from wondering about her relationship, or lack there of, with Drake to wondering if she's going to hook up with Jane.

This wouldn't be jarring if there were any times when we saw Jane in a romantic, or sexual light from Ree's perspective, but we don't. Here we see a very exterior, objective view of Jane as a hollywood starlet, a celeb burn out and being very poised. These are nice, but none of them scream "I want to fuck her so hard she forgets her name" or even "I can see us adopting a german shepherd named Bruce together." There's not even mentions of Jane's body in a sexy or seductive way. If I were Ree's friend and she'd used the same language in the narrative to describe this "new girl she likes" I'd wonder if she wanted to fuck her or just braid her hair and talk about boys. The thing is women who have had sex with, and are attracted to other women talk, think and look at other women they like in a sexual context. 

Now, I'll give that it might be complex to portray how a woman views another woman sexually if you're not a woman, but you can at least make an effort to not make it sound like Ree is checking out what Jan's got on display.

This kind of "pussy-footing" around a character's sexuality annoys the shit out of me. Authors need to shit or get off the pot already. If you're going to have characters have sex, than you shouldn't shy away from having them talk/think about sex in a candid manner. 

A woman who puts her face in pussy isn't usually going to have a hard time saying she does or thinking about how she wants to in her own internal monologue. 

And if the Celebromancy thing is going where I think it's going, I am not going to be so disappointed.

As it is the way that celebrity character is being framed is extremely problematic in how she isn't really humanized. The fact that she's obviously lifted from Lindsey Lohan, but given no real depth, outside of the typical psychic vampire with a pretty face, which pisses me off. It's an outside perspective of female celebrities, that turns them into vacuous characters or tragic stories of the dangers of superficiality. Putting the responsibility for how they are seen, and treated on their shoulders. Rather than acknowledging how both our culture and the entertainment industry play the biggest part in the meat grind that chews up and spits out women like Lohan. It would be nice to even how this book mention how a character like Jane is under enormous pressure to be "the whole package" and being actively punished for not living up to unrealistic expectations.

Maybe we will eventually get to see the woman behind the mask when it comes to Jane, but the fact that Ree (who is also a woman living in the same sexist world) doesn't see Jane as much more than a celebrity crush with "magical" attention getting powers, doesn't bode well. 

That bothers me too, that Ree, an adult woman, is making what feels like really immature choices and selfish choices. Like going drinking with someone who has gotten 3 DUIs. Contemplating hooking up with her, even though they're coworkers and Jane obviously is has a lot of personal issues. To be fair, I've dated a lot of not so stable women in my life, but I was much younger than Ree when I did it and I was being a selfish, horny asshole when I did it. I just hope that Ree acknowledges how she is objectifying Jane as much as any of the autograph hungry fans pawing at Jane. 

All these issues come down to nuance of characterization that just aren't there, and part of me wonder if they would be there if Underwood were a woman, or at least understood how these themes impact women. Research is a writer's best friend, but also having a strong grasp on how someone different than you (namely non-heterosexual women) experiences life. I'm starting to see the "man behind the curtain" and it's starting to ruin the book for me. 

I don't know. I'll keep reading, and hope for the best. 

Skillful description of Lindsey Lohan, without saying it's her.

Also, if Ree has a "Puerto Rican" complexion than there's some serious white washing going on in the covers of these book.

WTF?