How to Die Famous

by Benjamin Dean

Overview

For fans of Little White Lies and Two Can Keep a Secret comes an addictive thriller about a budding teen celebrity secretly investigating his brother's suspicious death while navigating the highs and lows of fame.

Rising star Abel Miller has just landed a role in one of the hottest reboots on the Omni Channel, Sunset High. It looks like he’ll be yet another budding celebrity plucked from obscurity, but he has a secret: his brother, Adam, a mere production associate, died during the filming of the last attempt at Sunset High, and no one knows how... or why. Abel is going to find out.
 
But when he meets the other stars of the show— Lucky, Ryan, and Ella, along with creator Lake Carter— he realizes there’s even more darkness beneath the shimmer of fame. They all have their own secrets to hide, and one of them is willing to kill to keep it that way.
 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780316519601
Publisher:	Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Publication date:	07/09/2024
Pages:	384
Sales rank:	435,896
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.60(h) x 1.25(d)
Age Range:	14 - 18 Years

About the Author

Benjamin Dean is a London-based celebrity journalist and author of Me, My Dad and the End of the Rainbow; The Secret Sunshine Project; and The King is Dead. How to Die Famous is his second YA novel. Benjamin can be found on Twitter as @notagainben tweeting about Rihanna and LGBTQ+ culture to his 14700 followers.

Editorial Reviews

05/06/2024

Young actors expose a deadly scandal in this twisty, tantalizing thriller from Dean (The King Is Dead) that pits “a billion-dollar company against four teenagers.” Abel Miller, who is “mixed race,” seizes the chance to costar in the reboot of the hit teen dramedy Sunset High; mysterious disappearances and death blight the original production’s “cursed” history. But he doesn’t accept the role simply to launch his career—a celebrity reporter approaches Abel to go undercover to investigate the off-set drama, to which Abel agrees for personal reasons: his older brother died in a “tragic accident” while working as a production assistant for the studio three years ago, and Abel suspects foul play. While befriending costars to untangle the truth (and his own romantic feelings for the leading man), Abel learns that Sunset High’s makers and players all harbor dangerous secrets that will prove deadly for one teen star. Multiple narrators deglamorize Hollywood’s every angle with searing social commentary on stalkers, abusive guardians, alcohol dependency, racism, sexism, and homophobia, while soapy drama and plentiful pop culture references keep this mystery compulsively readable. Characters are intersectionally diverse. Ages 14–up. Agent: Chloe Seager, Madeleine Milburn Literary. (July)

Publishers Weekly

"How to Die Famous is a firecracker of a novel, filled to the brim with twists and turns that made me gasp out loud and an ending I never saw coming. Benjamin Dean is masterful in his exploration of the dark and insidious nature of Hollywood, spotlighting the hidden bodies that lie along the path to stardom and fame."

—Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé, New York Times bestselling author of ACE OF SPADES

"A twisty whodunit that critiques the toxicity of celebrity while exploring bonds of friendship and brotherhood."

—Kirkus

“Searing social commentary…soapy drama and plentiful pop culture references keep this mystery compulsively readable.”—Publishers Weekly

From the Publisher

2024-04-20
A rising TV star vows to uncover the unsettling truth behind his older brother’s death.

British entertainment industry newcomer Abel Miller, a multiracial Black teen, has just landed a role on Omni Channel’s Sunset High, a star-making teen drama with a controversial history. An actress from the original series experienced a mental breakdown, and in 2022 the reboot’s junior assistant—Abel’s 22-year-old brother, Adam—died after falling from the roof of a hotel and a young lead actor vanished during her evening run. When Abel joins the cast in 2024, he partners with a tabloid journalist to expose Omni’s underbelly and shed light on the strange circumstances surrounding Adam’s death. As Abel adjusts to the spotlight, he connects with his three teen co-stars, who are guarding career-ending secrets. Soon, Abel’s mission is at war with his loyalties, and he realizes that Omni is much more dangerous than anyone could imagine. Told through first-person narration that alternates between Abel and white co-star Ella Winter, Dean’s sophomore YA novel effectively combines pop-culture elements with the tension of a murder mystery. The author explores the exploitation of children in show business, from the selfish demands of stage parents to the insatiable greed of industry executives, with realism. Abel’s unresolved grief is movingly depicted, and the ending, though a little too conveniently earned, leaves room for a sequel.

A twisty whodunit that critiques the toxicity of celebrity while exploring bonds of friendship and brotherhood. (Thriller. 14-18)

Kirkus Reviews