A Stranger in the Mirror

Sidney Sheldon

12/22/2001

Toby Tyler is a comedian who knows he can be the best in America. He knows because his mother told him so. He has to be able to convince the right people that this is the case. This takes a long while. He finally connects with the right person in Hollywood and begins to make his mark.

Josephine Czinski is a girl whose mother worked for all the "right" people in her town of Odessa. Josephine played with the best children socially. But she and her mother were the Pollacks who never quite fit in and never accepted. After falling in love with the wrong man, Josephine moves to Hollywood and becomes Jill Castle.

This is a pot-boiler saga that takes place over 50 years or so. It shows the seamier side of Hollywood and the power games. And frankly, it bored me. I kept waiting for it to pick up. I stayed with the novel until Toby's big break in Las Vegas was starting. I finally gave up and flipped through the rest of the novel, skimming it. It never improved, but I did finish it to get the gist of the story. Fame and power do not mean true love. This is the dog-eat-dog world of the acting business with characters that never come to life, in my opinion. I would suggest you look for something else.

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Notice: Explicit sexual situations