The gorgeous cover and the idea of a murder mystery in a reality TV setting really got me excited for this book.

We start the book with the fourth season of the show Goal Diggers getting ready to start, and our five main ladies with all their secrets to keep hidden. The book alternates between the perspectives of Brett, Kelly and Stephanie.

Brett is the 'star'. She is the young up and comer who is a fan favorite, but is hiding plenty.
Kelly is Brett's older sister who is harboring anger toward being overshadowed. She is new to the Diggers and basically just wants her share of the spotlight.
Stephanie is the oldest and only POC in the cast. She and Brett are best friends on the rocks, but that is only the tip of the iceberg.

There are some supporting characters that vary in stages of importance throughout the story.

I have to say this story took on too much of a feminist 'rant' at times, that became a little tedious and tiresome for me. You would have a character stating that women should be stomping down doors and breaking ceilings one minute, and then stating how much it meant to have a man's attention. None of the characters in this book are likable. They all start off having a glimmer of something that could be redeeming, but that doesn't last very long. I wanted to root for at least one of these strong, successful women, but they all drove me crazy with their behavior.

I think the author did a good job of weaving a believable story, with characters that (as annoying as I personally found them) could definitely be walking around the streets, or gracing our television sets, right now.

Thank you NetGalley, Jessica Knoll and Simon & Schuster for allowing me to read and review this book.

If you like Real Housewives and/or Unreal, you will also like this book. I read The Luckiest Girl Alive by Knoll, and really liked it, so I was thrilled to be approved for this one on Netgalley.

The marriage of reality TV and a psychological thriller novel was definitely a holiday gift to me. It was fun to read the producers' manipulations of the cast, with the stakes even higher than "real" reality TV since there was a death in this book. I also enjoyed the development of Stephanie and her navigation of not just gender and class, but also race. I am glad that Knoll included a complex black character in this novel. In terms of plot, there were a couple twists that I did not guess and I always love that when I read thrillers. Finally, Knoll's writing continues to be sharply clever, playfully acidic, and completely enthralling.

What I didn't like was that in comparison to Stephanie, I found Brett and Kelly to be underdeveloped. And then going a step farther, I found Jen and Lauren to not be developed at all. At least with Stephanie, Brett, and Kelly there was first person perspectives which allows the reader to better understand their motives and decisions. But since there was no first person perspective for Jen or Lauren, it created a character imbalance in my eyes. I think all characters should have gotten a first person perspective, OR only one should have. Having it be a little more than half was not a good writing decision.
I also didn't like that none of the characters were really likeable. But I think that might have been the point :)

Another pageturner from Jessica Knoll, and I can't wait for her next one!
Thank you to the author, publisher, and Netgalley for the ARC.

The writing in this book is fast-paced and creates a realistic portrait of talented women in a cut-throat reality show. Brett was the most interesting character to me, and her relationship with her sister was a great hook.. I was also pleased with the LGBT representation.
That said, I couldn't connect to the book. Jen and Lauren were too similar and I didn't care enough about the characters to continue past chapter 10 or so. However, could be a matter of personal taste. The book really did mirror a reality TV show and that's not my thing. I thought there would be more mystery in the plot, but it was mostly just lies being revealed. That said, I would recommend this book to someone who is really into reality tv shows like Housewives.

I truly struggled with this author's debut book (Luckiest girl alive). It got so much hype that I was convinced I was missing some integral aspect of it. I wanted to give this one a try to see if the style would be more intriguing to me the second time around. Unfortunately, it just didn't work for me. The characters are cliche and almost silly. The writing style didn't work for me and I found myself constantly bored. It is disappointing to say, but I guess I will never be a Knoll fan

ARC for review

I absolutely LOVED [author: Jessica Knoll]'s first book [book: Luckiest Girl Alive], one of the few titles that used the "if you liked [book: Gone Girl] you're going to love this" line and actually kind of made good on it (don't get me wrong....[book: Gone Girl] was better, but [book: Luckiest Girl Alive] was great, and to be the author's debut, good for her!). Anyway, I was hoping for great things from Jessica Knoll and was thrilled to read her second book.

And then.....not so much.

It wasn't that it was BAD. It had a great premise - an inside look at five stars of a reality TV show about women (kind of like the "Housewives" series, but more about women who have made successes of themselves) in its fourth season where the sister of one of the stars is added to the cast (again, looking at you, "Housewives.") This could have been fodder for all kinds of great backstage/editing room/writers room (look at the credits - ALL of these "reality" shows have writers), but that wasn't Knoll's focus.

We begin the book with interview prep with Kelly, the sister. She's getting ready to be interviewed by the show's producer about the death of her sister during the last season of the show, which takes us back to Kelly's casting, the relationships between the cast members (Kelly's sister Brett, Stephanie, the first African-American cast member and Brett's former best friend, Lauren and Jen), but, to be honest, all the characters are really ciphers save Kelly, Brett, Stephanie, Stephanie's husband, Vince and Kelly's daughter Layla. I couldn't keep Lauren and Jen straight to save my life and the "big secret" that is mentioned intermittently throughout isn't really that big a deal (or, at least, I didn't think so.)

I know that Knoll is a better writer and plotter than this, so I'm left disappointed. Again, decent premise, but poor execution. I'm wondering whether after the success of LGitW her publishers wanted another book out quickly (in the author's biography there's a note that Reese Witherspoon's production company has optioned LGitW, so maybe they see [book: Big Little Lies] numbers) and want to capitalize on them as quickly as possible, but I can't help but wish Knoll had been given more time and had made a greater effort. Gobble it up on the beach, but in six months you'll forget what happened, I fear.

so disappointed in this follow up novel. While the author writes very well, I can’t help the fact that I was disinterested and bored from the first page. The characters are cartoon stereotypes, and the pacing is way off. The book takes ages to take off, and even then, falls sadly flat.

Not for me this time

** spoiler alert ** While I thoroughly enjoyed this book and devoured it within days, it was a stark reminder as to why I do not watch reality TV. I wanted to reach through the pages and punch all of the characters in the face. Brett, who had to potential to be the most likeable, was nothing more than a liar. Her sister Kelly? A mooch? Stephanie and Vince? Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dumbass. Lauren and Jen? Nothing more than the Gretchen Weiners of Goal Diggers.

I think this was a fun and giggle-snort-inducing novel, but it was nowhere near as good as The Luckiest Girl Alive. At the end of this clusterfuck (not a dig at the story, but a dig at the characters' lives), it makes you realize how women really treat each other. Or at least how women on reality TV treat each other. #kardashiansarenotrolemodels