Celebrities in Disgrace: A Novella and Stories

By Elizabeth Searle

Book Overview

Inspired by a society obsessed with celebrities, Searle explores the glittery-dark underworld of 'hopefuls, ' those who have been given the slightest hint of success--or even imagined success--and who are hungry for an audience, of any size. Ranging from a woman's relentless pursuit to be an actress despite her tendency to faint onstage, to a disintegrating family who comes together if only to watch the imaginary lives in a soap opera, the stories in Celebrities in Disgrace capture the thrill and lure of fame and our insatiable need for it.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1555973248
• ISBN13: 9781555973247
• Release Date: April 2001
• Publisher: Graywolf Press
• Length: 186 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Searle is the celebrity not in disgrace.

This collection of stories is both humorous and sad. Searle is a fine wordsperson and she takes you into the original world of imagination within her characters. Her themes are loss, longing for recognition, real or imagined, worlds of celebrities and dysfunctional family issues. An interesting minor theme is Searle realistically portraying individuals with developmental handicaps in a real way. Their characters are neither grotesque nor "happy angels". This collection tells wonderful and original stories, a real treat.

sex for the complex

This whole collection feels strong and sure. Elizabeth Searle's style is such a pleasure!--the rhythm, the images, the sensual intelligent prose. These stories center around women and girls wanting and needing to be watched. The title piece works perfectly as a film noir novella. Tight, fast but complex; shapely; and it has a satisfyingly dark ending. I also like the story The Young and the Rest of Us. It has a lot of style and power, and a lot of feeling. Compassion for all characters. I read in order to learn how to live life, how to see the world and other people more clearly and deeply. Elizabeth Searle's writing gives me that!

The Mind of a Wannabe

rating for CELEBRITIES IN DISGRACE: 5 stars ***** The Mind of a Wannabe Fiction takes us strange places, and none are stranger than a fame-addicted mind. Searle's book is full of vivid people lacking all identity except as others see them - like a stalker looking for the next Pamela Smart, an adolescent acting out horror movies, a photography student imprinted on a charismatic professor. These are real people who will do anything - anything - to fill that gap where their self should be. Searle does us a great service in letting us see the cult of celebrity with new eyes, washed clean from the banal bios - "meteoric rise leads to substance problem but they're getting their life together" - we absorb every time we surf, watch, or read media.

A Must Read

"Celebrities in Disgrace" is Elizabeth Searle's thoughtful exploration of the disturbingly egotistical souls emerging from a celebrity-obsessed culture. The downfall of characters whose driving desire to be placed on a pedestal is tragic in "Memoir of a Soon-To-Be-Star", humiliating in "What It's Worth" and disturbingly and comically familiar to scandal-saturated pop culture watchers in the title story. "The Young and the Rest of Us" touches poignantly on the role of television in the life of a family struck by tragedy. And "Celebration" seems to be the antidote to these often-disturbing characters, portraying one couple's struggle to make the life and death decisions surrounding modern pregnancy.