Hollywood Nobody by Lisa Samson

Hollywood Nobody
Lisa Samson
ISBN 978-1-60006-091-5
209 pages
NavPress, 2007

Genre: Christian

Readers Annotation
15-year-old Scotty, whose mom works as a food designer for films, tries to figure out family, love, and God as she blogs about her experiences growing up on movie sets.

Plot Summary
15-year-old Scotty has never lived a normal life. Her mom works for the movies, as a food designer. They live on the road in an RV, moving from movie shoot to movie shoot. Scotty has an insider's view of the real Hollywood--she's met all the big stars and knows their weird secrets--but her closest friends are the senior citizens who also live the RV life. Scotty's mom, Charley, is an ex-hippie vegan who keeps a tight leash on Scotty. Scotty, whose two biggest passions in life are cheese and Hollywood gossip, relies on her RV and movie set friends to help her get her dairy fix.  She secretly runs a blog, Hollywood Nobody, where she gives the inside scoop about Hollywood to her readers.

On a shoot on a remote island off North Carolina, Scotty begins to come of age. She befriends Seth Haas, an up-and-coming actor who is both talented and incredibly nice. She gets to know Joy, the niece of two of her RV friends, who was on the verge of becoming a famous designer in New York, but is now living incognito as a waitress on the island. She wonders about God, deciding to attend a tent revival and to start reading the Bible. And she worries about Charley, who takes mysterious phone calls in the middle of the night and is clearly worried about someone finding them.

Critical Evaluation
Lisa Samson creates a likable character in Scotty. She celebrates that Scotty is not a cookie cutter conformist, emphasizing her love of vintage fashion, her love of food, and her healthy size. Scotty is homeschooled, and she's incredibly self-motivated. Large parts of the books are devoted to Scotty's homework; she picks interesting things out of her life to research further, such as the history of the island where they are staying. She's friends with an interesting variety of people; the only one her own age is Seth. Older than her are: Jeremy, the famous director of the film that's shooting; Grammie and Grampie, two of her RV friends from the road; Joy, the designer; and Seth's parents, who comment at one point that life would be pretty boring if you only hung out with people your own age. It's true for the book, too.  Some Hollywood gossip, naming both real and imaginary people, spices things up a little.

There's nothing on the book's cover or back blurb to suggest that it's Christian fiction, although it clearly is in that genre. In this book, Scotty is not a Christian nor a member of any religion, though she spends a good portion of the book pondering religion and Christianity, first from an intellectual standpoint and then from a more personal one. At the end of the book, Scotty decides that faith is a good thing, though she has not yet converted. Reading reader reviews of the other books on Amazon, it seems like religion becomes a bigger part as the series progresses. I believe that the book would appeal to non-Christian readers; the level of religion in this book seemed similar to the level of religion in Judy Blume's classic, Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret.

While not a particularly ground-breaking or innovative work, it's a pleasant book to spend time with.

Other Books in the Series
Finding Hollywood Nobody (2008)
Romancing Hollywood Nobody (2008)
Goodbye Hollywood Nobody (2008)

About the Author
Lisa Samson has written a number of novels aimed at Christian women. The Hollywood Nobody series is her second foray into YA writing. Her first, Apples of Gold, was a fairy tale parable aimed at encouraging chastity in teenage girls.

Curriculum Ties
This book is not well-suited for use in any school curriculum.

Booktalking Ideas
1. Talk about Scotty's strange life on the road, both on the edge of Hollywood and on the edge of nowhere.
2. Explore the friendship between Seth and Scotty, as well as her jealousy of Karissa, the beautiful young starlet who also has an interest in Seth.
3. Talk about Scotty's search for answers about God and her own family background.

Reading Interest/Level
This book would be of interest to junior high students and above. More sophisticated high school readers might find it a little too simplistic, but it would probably appeal to freshman and sophomores.

Challenge Issues
Since the book is part of the Christian genre, it might inspire challenges. Should it be challenged, the librarian should read the book if possible. If not, s/he should familiarize herself with reviews of the book. I did not find it reviewed in any of the professional journals, but there were blog reviews of it on TeenReads and others.  The librarian should be able to explain and defend the library's collection policy and be able to explain how Hollywood Nobody fits into the collection. Should it be challenged because it is a Christian novel, perhaps the librarian could point to novels centered around other faiths that are part of the library's collection and explain why having books from all faiths is an important part of a YA collection.

Selection Criteria
I thought it would be important to include some Christian YA books in my database, but I was unfamiliar with any contemporary titles. Through a Google search, I came across the Christy awards, which are given to the best Christian books every year.  Hollywood Nobody was the 2008 winner in their young adult category.