A girl meets a bad boy and wham! Her whole life falls apart. Then she decides
to turn the nice boy she hangs out with into a bad boy and wham! Her whole
being falls in love with him. How will Tracie ever get away from the bad boys
and write that book she has always wanted to write? Like some young adult
book written for the parents of those girls, BAD BOY is a simple little fable
about getting what you want and then not knowing what to do with it. Olivia
Goldsmith is good at this sort of thing --- she also wrote THE FIRST WIVES'
CLUB and THE BESTSELLER.
Tracie and Jonny's love story plays out against a stereotypical Seattle
backdrop that one might find in a VH-1 made-for-TV movie about the grunge
movement. The funny thing is, Jonny becomes a man about town when Tracie
turns him into some kind of scary Marlon Brando retrospective. And then he
wonders why she didn't like him before. But once you get a look at her
version of "The Rules" (i.e., "Wear either throwbacks from thrift stores or
really expensive Italian clothes. And mix them. Do on-line shopping only if
you want to have on-line sex"), you'll wonder why she ever had a date with
anybody to begin with and her brandishing her friend as a non-possibility for
love will make complete sense. Tracie is not the nicest girl on the block.
BAD BOY is another in the stream of Olivia Goldsmith books that she clearly
writes for Hollywood --- her back jacket blurb remarks that all but one of
her books have been sold to the movies. The epilogue to the book lists all
the "bad boys" she wants to thank --- half of them are prominent movie
business people. Next time, I think Ms. Goldsmith might want to skip the book
and go straight to the script. I'm sure it will be a big hit.
--- Reviewed by Jana Siciliano
