Review by Booklist Review
From reality TV to world tours, Lucky Girl is a ball of fun--one that begins to unravel just as quickly as it came together. Tagle-Dokus' debut novel follows the young, determined, and talented Lucy, whose passion for dance takes her across the dazzling yet often dangerous world of show business. Lucy's rise to stardom is guided by Bruise, a famous singer who takes an interest in developing the young dancer's career. Their relationship becomes increasingly toxic, setting the stage for the novel's exploration of unbridled ambition and refreshing self-discovery, including of one's sexual orientation. A thought-provoking take on the coming-of-age genre, Lucky Girl is not about lost innocence but about how we learn to see ourselves and the consequences of our decisions reflected in the world. Told from Lucy's perspective, the text is also concerned with racial inequity and representation in show business--encouraging readers to question what is visible on and off screens. Reading Lucky Girl brings out one of humankind's deepest desires: the wish to be seen by others, but most of all, by ourselves.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
A 12-year-old dancer leaves her troubled family to pursue her Hollywood dreams in Tagle-Dokus's uneven debut. Lucy Gardiner only wants to dance and not think about her depressed father, her mother's failed dreams as a playwright, or her older brother, Joel, whose ambition to make art is complicated by a drug addiction. She wins a dance competition and lands a spot on a reality competition show, where one of the judges, a seasoned pop star named Bruise, is instantly drawn to her. Bruise writes a song for Lucy, who performs in the accompanying music video, and the song becomes a huge hit. Lucy's parents then sign over guardianship to Bruise, and as she becomes a teen, she lands acting gigs as well as more dance roles. She also slips into an unhealthy co-dependent dynamic with her solipsistic guardian, who pulls her away from her family. When Lucy hears news of Joel's overdose and their mother's breast cancer, she's torn between her new life with Bruise and reconnecting with her family. The author uses clever narrative devices to convey the dizzying effects of reality TV production on Lucy, such as presenting multiple versions of events on set, but there's little momentum to the story or character development. Still, Tagle-Dokus crafts a canny tale of the vagaries of show business. Agent: Lauren Scovel, Laura Gross Literary. (Nov.)
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
A rollicking ride of a debut novel about the weird world of teenage stardom. Eleven-year-old Lucy loves to dance, and she's determined to win a spot at the Dance Awards, a national competition, even if it means ditching her best friend, threatening to kill herself if she can't attend an expensive competition in California, and plotting to blackmail her older brother to get him to help her hire a choreographer. Winning nationals is just the beginning: Lucy winds up onDance Till You Drop, Juniors!!, a fictionalized version ofDance Moms, a Lifetime reality-TV show. "I just want to dance," Lucy repeats, often as an excuse when her ambition wins out over her friendships with the other young dancers she meets in the hothouse-flower environment of reality TV. Throughout, Tagle-Dokus offers a lively critique of the manufactured melodrama of reality shows. "There is reality TV, and then there is the reality behind the reality TV," Lucy explains, "and that's why people watch, poised for the moment the visage slips. Reality tastes better after diet reality." Split pages--where Tagle-Dokus offers the "Diet Reality" version of scenes alongside the dance mothers backstabbing each other in the "Confession Booth" are followed by "Reality" sections, where Lucy tries to make sense of this warped world. When Bruise, a mega--pop star and one of the judges, takes a liking to Lucy, Lucy heads out to LA to become Bruise's muse and the oversexualized star of Bruise's music videos. Tagle-Dokus' depiction of Hollywood is both hilarious and horrifying, with adults behaving like spoiled children and children willingly giving up their innocence because they don't know any better. Despite her many mistakes, Lucy is a likable narrator, and the novel's many memorable characters--who aren't so dissimilar from the cast of a reality show--all have their own fascinating stories. A novel as binge-worthy as reality TV. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
