Cass is a mess. Just...floating through lift, escaping her own mistakes and trying to hide from the truth.

Cass arrives in LA in shame. She's left New York in a hurry - after the 'incident' with Tara Jean Slater. A once rising playwright, Cass has set fire to her career in a fit of jealousy. Once in LA, she meets a filmmaker in the middle of her next film about a group of young women. Cass finds herself immeshed in the film and in the lives of the girls.

What this book does best is explore emotions. Cass's fear of failure, her actual reckoning with the truth, jealousy, lust, pain and finally, acceptance. The reader is sucked into the story - I felt like I was Cass - with a spiral of confusion, anger and fear in the pit of my stomach.

This is excellent writing and storytelling from Jen Silverman and I'm excited to see what she does next.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read and review this book.

First of all, the summary of We Play Ourselves is misleading. It makes it sound like a thriller focused around the disappearance of a teenage girl. It's not a thriller, and going into this book expecting it to be will result in disappointment. The disappearance is a tiny part of the story. This is a work of literary fiction centered around Cass, a playwright who flees to LA after intense failure and scandal in New York. Most of the action happens before the start of the story and we learn about it later. It's a character study about Cass coming to terms with her failure and learning how to create again despite it.

I did love Silverman's satire of the New York theater industry. It's not a world I have any experience in, but based on my knowledge of "theater kids" from college, it seems fairly spot on. I laughed and cringed my way through Cass's narration of the New York events. Tara-Jean Slater is an absolute work of art and, ironically, my favorite part of the book. I loved Cass's hate for her, and at some point it became the only thing really pushing me forward with the story. The satire of the LA film industry is just as biting, though not as laugh-out-loud funny for me.

There isn't a single likable character in this book. Which is fine for me; I love a good, unlikable cast. I know this may be a major turn off for others. Unfortunately, I had a difficult time caring about most of the characters. Cass frustrated me to no end; she's right up there with Samantha from Bunny in the list of self-pitying main characters I want to smack. She doesn't even seem to have a legitimate reason for being as whiny as she is. I started out extremely interested in the group of teenage girls who are the focus of the Fight Club-esque film described in the summary. They have so much potential! But they ultimately aren't developed enough; I couldn't tell them apart, and Cass really can't either. B.B. is the only one who stands out, and I found the plotline with her predictable. But Tara-Jean Slater. Oh, Tara-Jean Slater. What a ridiculous person! I spent a good chunk of the book relishing in hating her. And by the end, I didn't hate her. She is the only character I cared about. I'd read a whole book about Tara-Jean Slater.

I had a difficult time getting into this book during the first half. It's slow, and Cass hides the most interesting aspects from us at first. She also does very little but drink and wallow in self-pity. I found myself putting the book down and not wanting to come back to it. The second half switches gears a bit. I ended up finishing it in one sitting. Cass finally starts doing things, and I did find myself enjoying this part. Was it worth the slow and painful buildup? I'm not entirely sure.

Overall, We Play Ourselves is a slow moving character study with some hilarious satire that may be good for fans of Ottessa Moshfegh's My Year of Rest and Relaxation. If you want something fast and thrilling, this is not the book for you.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

After a scandal, the young playwright Cass moves from NY to LA where she meets Caroline, a film director who's currently working on a movie about female rage with a group of teenage girls.
Unfortunately, I DNFed this book around 40%. Although the prose was beautiful at times, I had a lot of issues with the writing. Something I noticed, for example, is the overuse of the word 'like', once I noticed it I couldn't unsee it. Another thing that put me off was how Cass claimed to be in love with Hélène, and even after she told her so, I as a reader didn't believe it. It was more Telling than Showing. From what I've read, Cass is a rather unlikable character, which is part of the reason I couldn't bring myself to finish this book.

I really enjoyed the prose of this story. The writing was undeniably gorgeous and illustrative. I feel that most everything else fell short.
The general themes and message behind the story were interesting and I think they played out well for the first half of the story. I feel that the message kind of got lost after that in favor of incident-after-incident of characters being depressed and somehow clumsily relating it back to the struggles of women as a whole.
A couple of side characters were the only likable people in the story. Cass and Caroline were both terrible people and Cass constantly made mistakes I couldn't begin to understand. I thought there would be more resolve for the original scandal that landed her in LA to begin with, but this turned out to be an underwhelming incident and didn't seem like something she should have thrown her career away over. The ending felt disjointed from the entirely of the plot. Hate to bash on a new release like this, but the story progressed clumsily.

Disclaimer: I received an e-proof of this book in exchange for an honest review.

This book is about Cass, a playwright in her early thirties who has previously worked under the radar. After a brief brush with fame, Cass flees New York after a scandal involving a younger playwright, Tara-Jean Slater, which also leads to Cass’s agent cutting ties with her. I loved Cass’s connection to plays and her description of how much she connects with them. “And I won’t even try to guard myself, because I am being held by the architecture of the theatre, by every pair of arms in every seat, and I will sit still for a time between 75 and 120 minutes, and I will be naked, and I will be invisible, and I will be seen.”

After arriving in California, Cass begins helping her neighbor Catherine shoot a movie. I enjoyed how several of the characters’ works commented on feminism, and how Catherine’s movie gives Cass a chance to interact with young women who might see her as a role model. Cass seems to struggle with being cast out and failing, but also struggled with her five minutes of fame when she had it, which is very relatable. While I found some of Cass’s actions to be kind of cringey, by the end I respected and felt moved by her change in character.

After being involved in a scandal in the New York theatre scene, playwright Cass runs away to LA where she gets drawn into the movie-making process with her neighbour and 7 teen girls. Things get out-of-hand when the truth isn't disclosed early on and Cass has to come face-to-face with some tough love.

I have come to describe my feelings about this book as: meh. It isn't the worst thing I have read, but I have read better too. My main issue with the book is actually how it is being marketed and described. First off, under NetGalley's shelves it is considered LGBTQIA. So with that, I was expecting representation of varying different people in these categories and that to have a large impact on the story progression. It does not. It is mentioned mostly off-handed as Cass is queer and has several interactions with her sexuality. That isn't a huge issue to me, I still love the representation of a strong, feminist woman who is fully secure in her queer identity. The largest problem with this books marketing/description is the way they mention a disappearance of one of the girls. They make it seem like this huge pivotal point, that the book has some thriller/mystery aspects to it. It doesn't. Not even close. It does play into the story but not in the way they make it sound.
Cass as a main character is both relatable, and dislikeable. Relatable in the fact that she feels what I would consider to be imposter syndrome, which I know a lot of people in the millennial age group relate to (even me!). However, instead of growing from it, trying to overcome it, while still being happy for those around her that succeed, she just gets bitter. I found she had no redemption, which I was really hoping for. The story does end on a very relatable note and pulls things together, its more of a journey of self discover and purpose than her redeeming herself after her involvement in a 'scandal'. I found myself wanting more from secondary characters than I did from Cass.
One of my favourite things from the book was an interaction between Cass and her play director, Helene. She mentioned that no one is going to be as happy as you are for yourself when things are going well; but when shit hits the fan you better believe people want to be there to watch it all fall out. This to me is a perfect description of a lot of our downfalls as humans and it hit me close to home.
This book was a nice easy read, I did enjoy it at points, but there is always room for some tweaks and improvements that could make it just a tiny bit better.

Thanks to NetGalley and RandomHouse for the eARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own!

*I was sent a free ARC of this book by Random House in exchange for an honest review*

Author Jen Silverman’s first novel “We Play Ourselves” follows Cass, a playwright moving to Los Angeles to escape the scandal she found herself in in the New York theatre scene. Cass soon meets enigmatic neighbor Caroline, a filmmaker working on a project that immediately grabs Cass’s attention. As Cass devotes herself to the film project and attempts to pick up the pieces of her life, she discovers that theatre, art, and people are often not as they seem.

At its strongest, “We Play Ourselves” is a poignant and witty satirization of the absurd politics of the professional theatre scene. The way that Cass’s path entangles with that of other emerging playwrights was virtually the only part of the story that seemed believable and resonant. I had trouble suspending my disbelief on much of the other story elements, though. The reveal that should have been gut-wrenching and intense was shallow and anticlimactic. The dialogue was far too clear and intentional to feel realistic. The narration was often heavy-handed and over-explained the rather basic concepts being illustrated in the scenes.

Even more than the odd and out-of-character movements perpetrated by Cass, rival Tara-Jean, and even more tertiary characters like a friend’s boyfriend, the weakest point of the novel is undoubtedly its unsympathetic and immature hero - Cass herself. I was most taken back by her immense immaturity that she never seems to acknowledge or grow out of. She is supposedly in her thirties but acts like an irresponsible teenager. Her positioning in the narrative is virtually indistinguishable from the actual teenagers and she often acts inappropriately with them. By the end of the story I had no sympathy for Cass left, simply didn’t care if she succeeded or failed, I just wanted to be done with this entirely too long novel.

Maybe it’s just that common failing of debuts to try and Do Too Much, maybe it’s Silverman still finding her voice in the literary scene, as I understand her primary experience is in theatre, but “We Play Ourselves” was ultimately a disappointing attempt at navigating success and failure in the modern art world.

I absolutely loved this book. I was inclined to like it, just because I love anything about theatre, but it really exceeded my expectations and frequently hit way too close to home. I was a big fan of the bisexual representation--something often hard to find, even in literary fiction--and the way the book played with the idea of truth/reality. Overall, I would definitely recommend it and I look forward to reading whatever Jen Silverman writes next!

I thought this story would be about a comeback. It’s not. Don’t be fooled; this story is not a redemption arc, but it is about finding yourself and your own voice. It is not however, an easy journey.
The main character Cass is self sabotaging, she runs away, she’s unable. She is, in short, a mess. She’s an unlikeable main character.
It can be a frustrating read if you are wanting her to do the right thing, cause chances are, she won’t.
Worse than Cass/ Cath is Caroline... she only cares about herself and has a huge agenda.
Jocelyn, however, was a welcome reprieve and I found her hilarious.
Overall, I found this to be good, but I do wish we saw Cass pick herself up a bit more.

I was disappointed by this book. First of all, the summary blurb was misleading. I believed that this book would be more about finding a missing girl, but that ended up only being a small part of the story. So I believe that this book was not really advertised accurately. For people looking for a contemporary crime novel, this not NOT it. I also felt like the “fight club” girls were advertised as being a bigger part of the book, but again, they were not that important in the grand scheme of things. I actually would really like to read a book just about a group of teenage girls starting a fight club, without all the failing playwright stuff.
I did not like the main character at all. I think that I was the wrong audience for this book. I am not a fan of plays (musicals, yes - high brow plays that everyone pretends to understand but they really don’t, no.) I liked and appreciated the overall message of the book, that everyone has many lives and paths within them and any failure is not too big to bounce back from and make something new (and maybe unexpected) out of your life. I think it’s an important and timeless message, one that I and definitely other people can definitely relate to. But I couldn’t get over how unlikable Cass was.

I am not the biggest fan of contemporary books. This is usually something I can get past for a book marketed as a queer book, but this particular story made it difficult. It felt as though we were not moving towards anything throughout the entire book. Cass continually runs away from her problems while creating more for herself. This story felt as though it was marketed to be more of a contemporary-thriller based on the given summary. This is not at all what the book is. Cass is given opportunity after opportunity, with privilege literally handed to her, and she continues to sabotage herself. She blamed success itself for turning herself into a bad person when, in reality, she was already that person.
The writing of this book was solid. The intrigue of wanting to know what happened to BB and why Cass was running from NYC were the only things the kept me reading.

Oh how I loved this book! I seriously underestimated it when I started reading it--I went in worried that what I was about to read would be a self-serious meditation on NY versus LA art, a path I think we've all seen treaded far too many times before. Having finished it, I now feel terrible for jumping to that conclusion. This book is sharp and ambitious--much more ambitious than I ever expected. Silverman interrogates everything from the boundaries of what we can call art to the questionable authenticity of the roles we play in our lives. She creates a very vivid and real protagonist in Cass, a 33-year-old playwright dealing with depression and shame in the aftermath of an incident that remains a secret until about halfway through the book. Cass leaves New York for L.A. to get away from her tainted legacy, and in adopting a series of new personae, she finds herself reexamining old lies she told herself from a new perspective. Through much trial and error (seriously, a lot), she drags herself through the process of recovery and tries to find a new, and altogether healthier, way to approach the process of making and sharing art.

Favorite parts: I was very compelled by Silverman's satirical depictions of NY theater society and equally witty depictions of Silverlake hipsterism. I feasted on the connections the novel draws between its many different threads--the parallels between Helene and Cass' relationship and Cass and B.B.'s; the parallels between Caroline's project and Tara-Jean's; the parallels between Dylan's lies and Daniel's lies and Cass' lies. This book explores the notion of authenticity from all angles--artistic, romantic and otherwise. I think it did a wonderful job of covering the subject.

The things I didn't like as much: I never say this, because I think an uncertain ending can be a good thing at times, but I wish the book had offered a bit of resolution on Cass' most important relationships, specifically with Helene, B.B., Dylan, Jocelyn, Tara-Jean, and, yes, Caroline. I love that we don't know what her future looks like as far as her career goes. I want to know if those relationships are going to endure, or if she's going to scrap them in the project of starting a new life. It felt a bit hasty how quickly Cass moved on from her friendship with Dylan (the narration said that Dylan was eager to get rid of her). Her relationships with Liz and Nico, too, had no focus in the present-day timeline. I know Cass is someone who is quick to make an exit when she needs to "just leave" (as her play points out at the end), but as a reader, I wanted to know about those relationships we invested time in. I also felt that Tara-Jean, a satirical character in the pre-Incident timeline, was a bit hard to believe in the present. It's hard to add depth to a figure who your protagonist has hated for so much of the book, and I'm not sure Silverman entirely succeeded.

Last but not least, the irony of writing a review of a book whose protagonist finds reviews to be so loaded gives me some pause as I write this. Cass wouldn't want readers to rely on a review to tell them what a book is worth. (Of course, she also might not care, because I'm no Ben Brantley.) Cass would say that if you're reading this review and you're unsure, you should give it a chance. I have to defer to her on that one.

Absolutely loved how this book began - it promised to be funny and dark and strange and unpredictable. The lead character is a wonderful antihero whose side you're on even through acts of sheer crazy. But about halfway through, I got the feeling the writer talked herself off the ledge she'd started out on, and decided mainstream was the way to go. Still a good read, but one you just know was on the cusp of being great.

I absolutely loved this book! Every character is both absolutely infuriating and unlikeable, but I also found myself rooting for all of them at different times. Silverman's character development, the way she has the reader constantly questioning who's good and who's bad, who deserves our sympathy and who just needs to get it together, is masterful. I loved the incorporation of theatre and film into the plot. Also, the "big moment" plot twists were genuinely completely unexpected and absolutely nuts, but somehow worked perfectly for the story. The ending was not at all what I expected, but realistic and perfect. This was an extremely frustrating book at times, but also a book that I enjoyed more than many others I've read recently.

My thanks to NetGalley and Random House for an advance reader's copy.

Book Review for We Play Ourselves by Jen Silverman
Full review for this title can be found at: @fyebooks on Instagram!

This was a sort of dark yet comedic book. I think the description is slightly misleading because it is really more about pressures on women than it is something Fight Club-esque. Anyone who has worked in the arts would appreciate it this more than the average reader I think--it really speaks to the arbitrariness of who becomes famous.

Cass is a young NYC playwright who flees to LA after an embarrassing and potentially reputation-ruining event, as well as a little heartbreak. She stumbles on the next door neighbor Caroline and learns more about a documentary/film project she's undertaking: a teen female fight club with underlying themes of female empowerment versus a culture of toxic masculinity. Cass thinks this project might be a way to escape her imagined faults and failures and embark on a new creative endeavor.

This is a fascinating story about ambition and the constant need to record and perform for others online or in person. What is authenticity in this day and age, who cares and whose opinions matter?

This was an interesting coming of age novel. I’m here for the feminist LGBTQ+ millennial vibes. It definitely wasn’t what I expected though!

This wasn't what I expected but I really, really enjoyed it. It was dark in a really fun way, while maintaining the heart of a true coming of age type of story.

I'm a fan of Silverman's plays, so this was a particularly fun and insider-y read. Most notably, I found Silverman's descriptions of what it feels like to make theatre absolutely stunning and accurate (I highlighted a LOT of it). The plot of the novel seemed a bit surface-y to me, all things considered, but Silverman knows her prose and her characters definitely come to life. I liked it a lot.