Last year, I read the author’s DEBUT novel, “My Husband”, and despite a low average rating on Goodreads, I was part of a “niche audience” who found the glimpse into this particular French marriage, utterly fascinating. So, I was excited to see that award winning author Maud Ventura had a new novel translated from French to English.

Both book covers feature a glamorous Parisian woman, wearing signature red lipstick.💄

And, they share some other similarities as well…

In “My Husband”, we have an unlikable, narcissistic French Wife, who is OBSESSED with her husband, and shares the story of her marriage with us in the first person POV.

In “Make Me Famous” we have an unlikable, Narcissistic French/American Pop Star who is OBSESSED with FAME (and herself) who shares with us, in the First Person POV, the story of her rise and fall in the brutal World of Music.

Both books also feature a “MIC DROP” final scene as the book closes!

“My Husband” earned 5 stars from me because I was fascinated by the dynamics of the marriage and remained curious throughout the narrative about where the story was going.

“Make Me Famous” earns 3 stars from me because I am NOT as intrigued in the ups and downs of the Celebrity lifestyle, and this reads like a self indulgent Memoir, shared by our Pop Star Cléo from a Private Island where she is vacationing alone to recharge and write her next album. 💿

Which subject captures your fancy more, will determine which of the two books you prefer.

Expected Publication Date: May 13, 2025

Thank You to Harper Via for providing a gifted ARC through NetGalley. As always, these are my candid thoughts!

i read this as an arc from Netgally.

i would rate this a lower three stars. there were parts i was very interested in and felt like i couldn't put down the book but those parts were much smaller than the duller parts. as soon as i would put this book down i would have to force myself to pick it back up, hence why it took so long for me to finish.

i was so much more interested in what was happening in present time on the island than what her past was. I think i personally would have liked it more with more present time chapters and then flash back chapters in between.

the main character: cleo, is insufferable!! she just shocked me how much worse she was getting! and that was her exact point so for that, bravo! she was truly a rotten human. i mean seriously it was hard to read at times with how awful she is.

i liked my husband much more than this, but i will still be reading maud venturas books that come out after this. i just think that the formatting of how much past POV we got is what threw me off this book. it is well written and beautifully translated.


i also was not a fan of the ending. realistically i ask: how. it made me suspend my belief further than the rest of the book was having me, so it threw me off. i think there could have been a better way to reveal what's been happening than what was written.

i would say this one is definitely not for everyone but i see how a lot of people will enjoy this.

3.5 stars rounded up.
Make Me Famous is a grappling novel that takes place inside the deranged and obsessed mind of an A star singer-songwriter. Like Maud Ventura’s other work, My Husband, her strong suits are incredibly similar in this novel.
Ventura has a talent for writing nuanced and complex characterizations of female protagonists. If there’s one person I’d trust to write an enthralling villain you can’t help but root for, it’s Ventura. The highlights of the book were definitely Cléo as a whole and the detailed descriptions of her material possessions.
Make Me Famous, much like My Husband, suffers from pacing issues. The first 2 acts are delectable and really propel the story forward and in theory should’ve set the precedent for an excellent ending. However, I found the ending to be quite rushed and not nearly as fleshed out as I would’ve liked it to be. It simply does not match the rest of the novel as a whole. And it unfortunately diminishes the integrity of the novel.
Nonetheless, Make Me Famous is a very engaging read that’s difficult to put down. Ventura has an incredible future and so much potential to harness. I’m humbled to have been able to read this as an advanced copy and I can’t wait to read more from her soon. Thank you NetGalley and HarperCollins for the wonderful opportunity.

After reading My Husband, I knew I had to get my hands on Maud Ventura's newest novel. I think she purposely makes her characters unlikable but that works for me! I felt like the main character was self righteous and I can't deny that she was driving me crazy in the first quarter of the book but then all of the sudden it just worked. Maud Ventura will be an auto buy/auto read for me from now on.

Our main character, Cléo’s personality is so awful and her want for fame was so obsessive that I couldn’t finish this book. I felt like I was getting banged upside the head with the same sentence over and over. This will not stop me from reading a future novel by Maud Ventura, but unfortunately, this book was a miss and a DNF for me.

Maud Ventura's "My Husband" was one of my favorite books of last year, so when I saw her second book on here, I HAD to request this.

Cleo was absolutely the most obsessively psychotic main protagonist that I've read about in awhile, maybe since reading My Husband. This was INSANE!!!! We get to watch Cleo's extremely calculated rise to fame, and where she ends up. We get to see how she treats, uses and abuses everybody around her.

The ending had me literally yelling "NOOOOOO!!!!!" when I realized what was happening....not that I was complaining. Cleo sounded insufferable the entire book, but I just did not see that ending coming.

This is a very well plotted, written, and thought out unhinged novel about fame and probably how a lot of celebrities get there or stay there.

I will be thinking about this book for along time. It will probably be one of my top books of 2025. I cannot wait for the audiobook to come out. I can't wait for this book to come out so all of my book pals can read it and I can openly talk about it!!!!!! 5/5

Thank you to Muad Ventura for writing this, and to her, publishers, and Netgalley for letting me read this wild unhinged tale.

Maud Ventura… you’ve done it again!!! Cleo is quite literally the most insufferable main character written. Her obsession with fame and perfection was psychotic; I could not look away. The way fame is written was quite a point of reflection for me. I found myself thinking about how much celebrities do that can be calculated. I found myself a bit confused by the island subplot, but of course as expected there was a typical Ventura twist at the end! Cleo’s internal monologue was so awful to listen to, I could not stop reading. Another hit for Ventura for sure!

really well written story about a very interesting protag with the same vibes as My Husband, but an even more impressive effort. 5 stars. tysm for the arc.

Make Me Famous by Maud Ventura is a darkly satirical, psychologically rich exploration of ambition and fame. Cléo’s obsessive rise to stardom is both mesmerizing and unsettling, capturing the hollowness of celebrity culture with razor-sharp wit. Ventura’s immersive writing makes Cléo’s descent gripping, though the story occasionally lags. Fans of unhinged protagonists and social critique will love this twisted, thought-provoking read. A bold, compelling novel.

“Make Me Famous” is by Maud Ventura. This book follows Cleo, a global sensation singer/songwriter from her beginnings to living her life of fame. The book takes place on a deserted island, but Cleo reminisces about her past and how she got to where she currently is (both to the island and her fame). While others might have disliked the blunt ending, I rather liked it - it reminded me of some old “Twilight Zone” episodes where you get an ending you aren’t expecting. I know that I wouldn’t like Cleo as a person, but she also has her own demons that she’s facing. I do recommend reading the translator’s notes - pretty interesting glimpse into being a translator when your author speaks English and choosing just the perfect word becomes a bit more time consuming.

This book just wasn’t really giving me what I wanted from it, but I finished because I had to see how it ended.

Another entry in the ever-growing category of stories where the idea is “woman is obsessed with something” and little else. The obsession here is with fame - our narrator is desperate to become a famous pop star - but beyond that, there’s not much to it. She wants to be famous, she becomes famous, she has a dark secret. The story is quite predictable. From the moment the premise is established, you can pretty much chart exactly where it’s going to go, and sure enough, it goes there. The protagonist’s spiraling fixation is compelling enough in the moment, but there’s no real depth beyond the surface-level satire of celebrity. The book never fully commits to being a sharp critique or a psychological deep dive, so it just sort of hovers in the middle, feeling slightly hollow. It is at least fast-paced. I wouldn’t say it’s bad, but I also wouldn’t say it’s particularly memorable. If you haven’t burned out on this type of story yet, you might find something to enjoy here.

Read this in less than 24hrs, love it but am still thinking...

Writing-wise it's totally what I expected & wanted from Maud. The more translated lit I read the more I notice nuances in source languages—this is a beautiful example of French lit translated seamlessly. Had it not been for those cultural differences, you'd swear Anna Dorn wrote this. The snide (and HILARIOUS) remarks, teetering on the cusp of its Overton Window, transitions from one mindset to another coming on subtly—jarringly so (in a good way). Ahh I just love Maud. My Husband (the novel lol) has a special place in my heart as the first translated lit that truly "fooled me" enough I was under the impression its source language was English. I kid you not, it was on my Translated Fiction shelf for MONTHS before realizing.

The ending though... AGH I'm torn. I'll leave it at that for spoiler's sake.

TBD... I'll be back...

Thank you times a million to Harper Via, I am no joke HONORED to be able to read early without having to fight my son for my kindle the entire time.

Make Me Famous by Maud Ventura is about Cleo, a woman whose only goal in life is fame.

I LOVED My Husband by this author and was so excited to read more from her! Make Me Famous is full of a lot of the same things I loved from My Husband (an unfiltered inner monologue of a questioningly evil woman, deep and comprehensive study into one main character, some suspense, etc.) I had a lot of fun reading about Cleo. She was diabolical and insane in ways that made it impossible to look away from her.

However, there were parts of this that made me like it a lot less than My Husband.
- The middle became very repetitive. The author does a great job making every aspect of Cleos life so detailed which creates a great immersive story, but it also caused the middle to drag a bit for me. Eventually I was feeling like ... I get it, Cleo only cares about herself and fame, she loves herself but hates herself, no one will leave her alone... ok lets move on!

- Oof the ending felt forced and didn't seem to fit with the rest of the story for me. It felt like the author was trying to squeeze in an exciting twist or reveal that really wasn't as revolutionary as the buildup made it seem.

Overall I had fun with this!

Thank you to netgalley and the publisher for the free digital ARC in exchange for an honest review :)

Another delicious read by Maud Ventura ,her first translated novel Husband swept me away I couldn’t put it down..Her latest Make Me Famous following Cleo’s desire to be find fame .A character like one I’ve rarely read about her raw personality life path kept me turning the pages a wild unique read.#netgalley#harpervia

*Make Me Famous* by Maud Ventura is a sharp and darkly humorous exploration of ambition, obsession, and the price of fame. With razor-sharp prose and an irresistibly compelling protagonist, Ventura crafts a thrilling and unsettling tale that keeps readers captivated until the very last page.

This was more like a 3.5 for me, and enjoyable read but not as binge worthy as her last book. I think there will be a lot of people out there who enjoy this more than I did, but this book just has a few tropes that I tend to not enjoy such as the deserted island trope and really any fame related trope. I knew that the book would be about these things going in common but I overlooked them in hopes that the female rage element of the book would be the thing that kept me interested as a female rage is a topic that I adore reading about, particularly when it’s done well. But this read less like justified female rage and more like obsession, which might have been fine had I expected that going into it but I have a habit of disliking books whenever I am expecting one thing and then I get another. The writing here was still well above average and made it so that even as I was reading about things that I didn’t really care about I still somehow managed not to be bored because the author writes in such a way that makes for easy reading. I’d say this is for fans of people that do enjoy vacation trope And obsessive stalker trope.

Maud Ventura’s Make Me Famous offers an intriguing, if uneven, dive into the psyche of a woman so determined to attain fame that her behavior often veers into sociopathic territory. Unlike her previous book, *My Husband*, which I devoured in a day or two, this novel felt like a slog to get through. The narrative captures the raw ambition and vanity of its protagonist, yet it misses the signature humor I love in contemporary novels. Instead, it left me with cringeworthy feelings of annoyance at her self-obsessed antics, making it feel like a stark, and perhaps too realistic, look at the pitfalls of modern celebrity culture. While it may resonate with readers drawn to darker character studies, it didn’t quite hit the mark for me.

“My problem is that I’m too nice”, she said after murdering someone.

It’s not easy to write a book about sociopaths/mentally unwell women that doesn’t come off as glamorizing mental illness or trying to make content that fits in with annoying tiktok trends that center around being unwell or being a “manhater” or “bedrotting. In other words, it’s hard for authors to write insufferable characters well; but Maude Ventura did just that.

Cleo Leouvent is 100% absolutely batshit insane, but trust one thing she’s good for is a KI. This girl is an absolute comedian which may be an odd way to describe a murderous baby hating sociopath, but I guess that’s a testament to Ventura’s engaging writing style.

I was hooked by the depiction of fame in this book especially since the era Cleo lives in is the modern technology/Tiktok era. All of it felt so real… like it’s stuff your average celeb prob does (especially the faked Tiktok rant about mental illness). Ventura managed to depict fame as a wild drug and she was clearly able to show the physical and emotional effects of the drug through Cleo.

This was such a fun book, I devoured it in a day. The ending was hilarious as well. 10/10 recommend.

Ooooh, that ending! I loved Maud Ventura’s My Husband and I was really excited to get an early copy of her new one. As you might guess from the title, our main character Cléo had one goal: to become famous. She achieves her goal by becoming a world-famous pop superstar—think Taylor Swift, but one big difference: hiding under Cléo’s glossy exterior is a seriously sociopathic personality. While I did find some of Cléo’s musings on fame to be feel a bit repetitive, overall I loved this and can’t wait for Maud Ventura’s next one.

Thanks so much to HarperVia and NetGalley for my review copy! Make Me Famous launches May 13, 2025.