Hollywood Dirt by Alessandra Torre

Synopsis: Cole Masten. Abandoned by his superstar wife, Hollywood’s Perfect Husband is now Hollywood’s Sexiest Bachelor: partying hard and screwing even harder. Watch out Los Angeles, there’s a new bad boy in town.

Summer Jenkins. That’s me, a small town girl stuck in Quincy, Georgia. I cook some mean chicken and dumplins, can bluff a grown man out of his savings in poker, and was voted Most Friendly my senior year.

We were from different worlds. Our lives shouldn’t have collided. But then Cole Masten read a book about my small town. And six months later, his jet landed on our dusty airstrip, and he brought Hollywood with him.

From the start, I knew he was trouble. For our town. And for me.

Sometimes, opposites just aren’t meant to attract.

Review: I saw a lot of praise for this novel and I confess that I was really looking forward to get into the story! It must be said that it is an environment on which I didn’t read much!

Summer is excluded from the city where she lives with her mother. Why? We seem to understand that it has to do with her ex, but we will have to wait until the end of the novel to really know more about it. But this conflict makes her dream of another life and she wants more than ever to leave this little town. Alas, money is lacking. But when she learns that a movie (produced by Cole Masten) is going to turn in her home, she does not hesitate to put herself forward to try to win a little from it. She was not expecting the first role.

I admit that I had a little trouble getting into the story. I would struggle to point out the reason … The chapters are short and follow Summer and Cole each in their lives. It was quite difficult to pass from one character to another without further development and it is true that we easily feel the break of the narrative. Similarly, the gossip at the end of chapters does not help to see more clearly. Yet everything works out when the two characters meet. The narrative is easier to follow and it alternates between the two protagonists through their encounters. I admit that I got a lot more involved at the time and although the characters are sometimes a bit frustrating and changeable, it was nice to attend their exchanges.

The end was very nice and I really enjoyed knowing the truth about her exclusion from the city. I just didn’t love it as many. Something was lacking for me.