Author:  Laurne Weisberger
Title:  Last Night at Chateau Marmont
Publisher:  Atria Books

After years of paying dues playing in small clubs and doing grunt work as an intern, Julian Alter just hit the big-time. SERIOUS big-time: we're talking Leno and a gig at the Grammy® Awards here.

Finally! All that time Julian's wife Brooke put in working two jobs to keep a roof over their heads and food on the table has paid off. It's time to kick back and enjoy the ride, now that their dreams have come true. It's all designer wardrobe and drinks with Bon Jovi these days, baby. What could be better? Everything they've ever wanted has arrived and life is good, right?

Right?

Maybe not.

Author Lauren Weisberger—she of The Devil Wears Prada fame—takes an unflinching but sympathetic look at the realities of overnight celebrity. Sure it's fun to have fans, but having to install blackout shades (and keep them pulled down at all times) to avoid paparazzi photos of your ‘just rolled out of bed' hair is not all it's cracked up to be. Not to mention the strain the rollercoaster ride of fame puts on Julian and Brooke's marriage. As a sympathetic movie star tells Brooke, "It feels like the entire world has been invited into your home and every one of them has something to say about it."

His record company whisks Julian hither and yon for this talk-show appearance, that celebrity birthday party, and who knows what other appearance. Meanwhile Brooke, who actually enjoys her jobs and would like to keep at least one of them, has to balance her available vacation days and workload against Julian's hectic schedule. She can't go everywhere with him, but who knows what he's up to when he's out with his slightly sleazy manager and sprightly young publicist?

The Chateau Marmont of the title is THE Hollywood hotel, a fabled place where, as Brooke's dad breathlessly exclaims when they check in, "Do you know Jim Morrison tried to jump off the roof there? And that the members of Led Zeppelin rode their motorcycles through the lobby? From what I've heard, it is the place to be for badly behaved musicians." (Foreshadowing alert there.) And indeed, the Chateau does become a symbol for all things rock star—good, bad, and ugly.

Celebrities are people, too—and Weisberger gives us a taste of what it's like to be on the other side of the tabloids. Of course, Julian and Brooke aren't the only people in the story. I particularly liked Brooke's best friend Nola—everyone should have a Nola in their life—and both sets of parents were realistically awkward. Reading this book is much like indulging in an extended gab session with a celebrity-obsessed friend (with a "colorful" vocabulary).

It's hard enough to balance a "normal" job and a relationship, much less trying to deal with conflicting career and family goals in the harsh glare of the media spotlight. In the end, Brooke and Julian have to decide if their commitment to each other is strong enough to stand the test of what happened Last Night at Chateau Marmont.

**This review first published on September 14, 2010.