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Title: The Love Song of Jonny Valentine
Subtitle: A Novel
Author: Teddy Wayne
Narrator: Kirby Heyborne
Format: Unabridged
Length: 11 hrs and 55 mins
Language: English
Release date: 02-05-13
Publisher: Blackstone Audio, Inc.
Ratings: 4 of 5 out of 50 votes
Genres: Fiction, Literary
Publisher's Summary:
For fans ofA Visit from the Goon Squadand Joyce Carol OatesBlonde, here is a scathing and enthralling new novel about Americas monstrous obsession with fame from the winner of a 2011 Whiting Writers Award.
Megastar Jonny Valentine, 11-year-old icon of bubblegum pop, knows that the fans dont love him for who he is. His image, his voice, and even his hairdo have been packaged - by his LA label and by his hard-partying manager-mother - into bite-size pieces for easy digestion, sliding down the gullet of mass culture, the biggest appeal to the widest demographic. But somewhere inside the relentless marketing machine is still a little boy, devoted to his mother and determined to find his absent father among the countless, faceless fans - isnt there?
A twisted, brilliant, and viciously funny coming-of-age story set inside corporate arenas and luxury hotel suites, Teddy WaynesThe Love Song of Jonny Valentineexplores with devastating clarity the underbelly of fame in 21st-century Americas celebrity culture, told through the eyes of one of the most unforgettable child narrators since Holden Caulfield. This novel is a literary masterpiece from the award-winning and critically acclaimed author ofKapitoil - one of the standout writers of his generation.
Teddy Wayne is the award-winning author of Kapitoil and a journalist who contributes to a variety of national publications.
Critic Reviews:
"The Love Song of Jonny Valentinetakes us deep into the dark arts and even darker heart of mass-market celebrity, 21st-century version. In the near-pubescent hitmaker of the title, Teddy Wayne delivers a wild ride through the upper echelons of the entertainment machine as it ingests human beings at one end and spews out dollars at the other. Jonnys like all the rest of us, he wants to love and be loved, and as this brilliant novel shows, thats a dangerous way to be when youre inside the machine." (Ben Fountain,New York Timesbest-selling author)
"Id wanted to go slowly and readThe Love Song of Jonny Valentineover the course of a week or two, but once Jonnys voice got into my head, I was hooked and kept picking it back up, and so I ended up on the last page, reading that final, amazing sentence, at like three in the morning. This novel is a serious accomplishment. America as we know it, with laughs on every page, but also a book that doesnt take one cheap shot. And at the swirling core, you have an 11-year-old boy trapped by his fame and trying to figure out how to move through the world, and who wants nothing more than to find his father. This is a book with a runaway narrative engine, tremendous ambitions, and an even bigger heart. I do not lie when I tell you: Teddy Wayne is as good a young writer as we have." (Charles Bock,New York Timesbest-selling author)
"What is most searing about Teddy Waynes splendid new novel is not his trenchant social criticism, nor the itchy, unsettling way that he makes tragedy entertaining, but that in the bubble of celebrity which comprises little Jonny Valentines whole world, at times the only differences between the savvy, drug-taking, lonely adults and the savvy, drug-taking, lonely kid himself are his outsized talent, and their avarice plus wrinkles." (Helen Schulman,New York Timesbest-selling author)
