If this book had been any longer it would have landed on my DNF list. Painful.

Bobby Rydell, born Robert Louis Ridarelli in 1942 in Philadelphia. One of his first performances was in 1952 in Paul Whiteman's TV Teen Club, he started playing drums at the age of 9, and later performed in 1959 on American Bandstand. He recorded Kissin Time when he was 17. Since then his career took off with numerous records such as the popular Volare, Wild One and Swinging School. He performed on many shows such as American Bandstand, The Perry Como Show, The Ed Sullivan Show etc, and also appeared in Make Room for Daddy and in Bye Bye Birdie with Ann Margaret. The impressive singer appeared on American Bandstand for 33 and 1/3 years. 

 

I was born in 1953 so when I was able to recall Mr.Rydell, his career had already taken off. I do remember hearing all of the teen heartthrobs during that time period as my parents were huge fans. So I definitely grew up listening to this music. I absolutely loved Bye Bye Birdie, of which Mr. Rydell appeared. A time when rock and roll was definitely taking off with Bobby Darren, James Darren, Fabian and Frankie Avalon for starters then moving on to Elvis and the Beatles. Amidst health concerns, family dysfunctions Mr. Rydell's career flourished and he is still performing today at the age of 74. Very impressive indeed. I generally don't read a lot of biographies as they can get bogged down in details, but this one was easy to read and interesting and I enjoyed it. 

 

 

Vintage Meg Cabot, she just keeps getting better! Luke Striker is a hollywood teen who is researching high school for a role, Jen Greenley is the school confidante. She is supposed to help him pretend. Love, Life and high School.

Full review also posted here on TotalTeenFiction.

Plot: 4* Audio: 2* Average: 3*

Teen Idol tells the story of Jen who works as an agony aunt for the "Ask Annie" segment of her school paper. Her teachers then entrust her with the knowledge that famous actor Luke Striker will be joining the school as research for his latest film project, and they assign Jen to be his student guide.

I'll be honest, it took me a little while to get into the flow of this one. The story starts out with Jen telling lots of anecdote about her school life as a way to introduce us to her fellow characters and setting the scene. I thought this part of the book went on for far too long and soon I was getting slightly impatient and itching to get to a part where something important happens.

The story really picks up when Luke Striker arrives at the school. Understandably all the girls go crazy for him so it added a lot of interest to the story. Luke as a character didn't play quite a big a role as I was expecting, but he did surprise me by being a really fascinating character. I loved how he saw the best in Jen and tried to help her out, even if it didn't always go as planned!

I really fell in love with the whole idea of the school's Ask Annie project. At the start of each chapter you get a question from someone who's written in to the paper which is then answered by Jen who writes secretly as Annie. I thought it was a great platform for Jen and really helped me as a reader get inside her head. I ended up agreeing with all the advice she gave too! The girl talks sense. I also loved the sarcasm and humour Jen demonstrates as well as her sensitivity. There were other aspects of school life I loved too, like Jen's reluctant involvement in show choir which had me giggling away.

There's lots of romance to get stuck into with Jen developing a crush on Luke. There's also the matter of her best friend Scott who is a really nice guy. Then of course there are the many, many girls who want to try and win Luke's affections, as well as Jen's best friend having relationship drama.

Jen herself goes on a real journey as a character throughout Teen Idol and we see her change and develop in both good ways and not so good ways. I loved seeing her stand up for herself a bit more and take on some of Luke's advice.

Despite it's slow start I did settle into this book and ended up enjoying it, particularly the second half. The ending was really sweet and I liked how all the little bits of the story came together.

Unfortunately I didn't really enjoy the audiobook experience of this one. The copy I downloaded from the library wasn't the best quality, but obviously that might have just been a problem on my end so I'm not going to judge it on that. It was more the narration that was a bit of an issue for me. It didn't flow very well and there were pauses in odd place sand it sometimes sounded like the narrator was running out of breath.

I did, however, think the narrator had the voice of Jen spot on and it did help bring her character to life. The slightly sarcastic Ask Annie segments at the beginning of each chapter really packed a punch. I just wish that could have carried to the rest of the story.

Find more books like this at TotalTeenFiction!

To see full review and Hollywood Analysis click here: http://yalbookbriefs.blogspot.com/2012/07/trend-spotlights-hooray-for-hollywood.htmlI often forget about Teen Idol and it's not because it's a bad book, in comparison's to Meg's other titles this one is sort of....well, just there.The book itself has fairly decent characters and it the storyline is solid enough. But it's nothing special. And perhaps that's what my problem with it is.The plot is pretty generic, good girl Jen's life is changed when movie star Luke Striker shows up in her small town and shakes up things. Honestly, while I am glad that Cabot didn't go the cliche route of having Jen and Luke end up together, I really wondered what Luke's purpose was other than to be a catalyst. Couldn't Jen come up with the conclusion that things in her life weren't perfect? From what was happening in her life before Luke's intervention, I believe she could. But I guess the book wouldn't have sold if he hadn't made an appearance.Also, another big issue I had with Luke was who he ended up with. Geri was a quasi horrible bitchy character. And while it was true she was nowhere near the likes of Lana Weinberger, I still didn't like that all the boys-including Scott-seemed to like her. Especially Luke who seemed to be about seeing someone's natural beauty. Geri just seemed to be this brash kind of bitchy character. She wasn't terrible, but I just don't see her Luke let alone Scott.As for Scott, the love interest in the novel, I didn't like him as much as some of Cabot's other heros. He wasn't awful. He was nice. He cooked. And I liked that, I just felt like I didn't get to know him that well. And while I understand why Jen liked him, I wished their relationship would've been more developed.Things I really did like about this book: the fact that it was a stand alone. While I do like series, it was nice to read something where I didn't have to wait for a sequel. And I really liked how everything was wrapped up in this book. Plus, did I mention it had a nice message that wasn't overly preachy. Yes, that was nice. Plus, did I mention that there's show choir in this book. Yes, all you Gleeks there are some pretty funny show choir scenes in this book which makes me think they really need to bring on Meg Cabot as a consultant for Glee. Best Feature: Not Your Typical Hollywood Story: This book isn't what I expect, meaning I thought Luke and Jen were going to fall in love with each other. No, that didn't happen. And I liked that in a weird way, but at the same time I really had to wonder what was Luke's purpose other than being Jen's Jiminy Cricket. Still though, despite Luke's lack of a role to the story, I liked that it wasn't cliche.Worst Feature: Meh. As far as Meg Cabot novels go, this is a good book. But it's not that memorable. While I think there was a good message in the novel. I just....I wanted something more. I honestly, felt while the foundation was there, there was just something off about the book that it never reached its potential. Perhaps, it was how Luke was handled as a character and for that matter who he ended up with.Appropriateness: This is a pretty clean novel. There is some bullying that goes on in the book, but other than that I can't think of anything remotely inappropriate. In fact, I would recommend this book for teens because of the bullying issues that go on in the book. I love the message this book tries to send without being overly preachy.