Movie stars' lives are so devoid of authenticity, every interaction so infected with false friendships and fawning admiration ("You look great! That was awesome!"), that their relationships with those closest to them must be tainted by that same mendacity. Such is the premise of Little Known Facts, the debut novel by Christine Sneed, a clear-eyed and disturbing assessment of how being the child or lover of a George Clooney-level film star means always wondering if people see you for who you are or are blinded by the reflected glow.
Everyone is turned on and interested by the aging-but-still-magnetic Renn Ivins: women want to sleep with him; men want to know what it's like to sleep with him. Sneed examines the effect of this obsessive interest by adopting the perspectives of various members of his inner circle. Among the effective characterizations: Renn's son, a brooding trust fund slacker who moves to Paris to escape his father's shadow; his daughter, a doctor-in-training whose "good girl" status tarnishes when she pursues a Renn-style affair with an older man; and his son's ex-girlfriend, whom Renn sleeps with because he just can't help himself.
Eventually, Renn's son's attempt at Parisian anonymity collapses when he falls back on the only way he knows to get people's attention and lets slip his lineage. By then, Sneed has convinced us that proximity to celebrity means never being free; it means being trapped in orbit to a blinding star. --Cherie Ann Parker, freelance journalist and book critic