New York Times bestselling author and beloved actress Victoria Rowell delivers another hilarious novel and shocking send-up of the soap opera world, featuring Calysta Jeffries, the unstoppable diva of daytime drama. As we learned from Victoria Rowell’s smash hit Secrets of a Soap Opera Diva, no one gets in the way of leading lady Calysta Jeffries. Now, after a brief stint in drug rehab, Calysta is back on the set and ready for action as she resumes her role as the star of The Rich and the Ruthless. But not everyone in the cast and crew is happy to have the diva back. As soon as she wraps her first return episode, some of her fellow colleagues and cast members are conspiring, once again, to sabotage her career. She’s already survived amnesia, an alien abduction, and death three times over—but all that and a real-life alcohol abuse problem couldn’t keep Calysta down. So her enemies come up with the nastiest plan ever devised. They invite Calysta’s beautiful daughter Ivy to audition for The Rich and the Ruthless and offer her a role alongside her very competitive mother, turning Calysta’s whole world upside down. Ripped from the headlines of TMZ and packed with behind-the-scenes secrets, Victoria Rowell’s latest soap opera drama crackles with salacious details and over-the-top, hot and heavy hijinks. You won’t be able to put it down. Ripped from the headlines of TMZ and packed with behind-the-scenes secrets, Victoria Rowell’s latest soap opera drama crackles with salacious details and over-the-top, hot and heavy hijinks. You won’t be able to put it down.

この作品の真髄は、虚構のメロドラマと過酷な芸能界の現実が、目眩を覚えるほどの筆致で融合している点にあります。著者のヴィクトリア・ローウェルは、自身が長年身を置いた昼メロの世界を冷徹かつユーモラスに解体し、煌びやかなスポットライトの裏側に潜む執念や「生存競争」の生々しさを、唯一無二のエンターテインメントへと昇華させました。 単なる業界の内幕物にとどまらず、本作が放つ文学的な輝きは、主人公カリスタが直面する母娘の相克という普遍的な葛藤にこそ宿っています。自らの地位を脅かす実の娘の登場は、女性としての焦燥と、頂点に立ち続ける者の孤独を鮮烈に浮き彫りにします。虚飾にまみれたドラマの展開を凌駕するほどに熱く、スキャンダラスな人間賛歌が、読者の魂を激しく揺さぶる一冊です。