Welcome to Litsy!

Another entry in my favorite subgenre: books about depressed women with too much money ( #BADWWTMM ), Choco $$ delivers the tale of partying heiress Babs Ballantyne, as told by her unfortunate bystander of a daughter. It definitely hews a little close to revisionist revenge autobiography instead of, you know, fiction, and in that sense it's tragic, but still... a tragedy that I couldn't put down.

Neely, your basic triple threat egomaniac monster, is first to climb aboard the doll train to crazytown. Naive babe Jennifer & sweet dull Anne follow. They're up, they're down, and they are all a-holes: "Tomorrow she can buy another wig," one of them sneers after throwing a wig in a toilet, while another writes "sorry I couldn't stick around for your wedding" in a suicide note. The ultimate camp train wreck, this book never stops being hilarious.

This doesn't come out until may, but I've been savoring the galley and am completely loving it. The writing is deliberate, the characters are odd and finely drawn, and the setting involves my absolute favorite type of character: the depressed rich woman!! If contemporary California noir is your bag, add this one to the list.

Ranking number two on my list of top 3 Susanns, this book is constructed entirely out of chain smoking, hamburgers, intramuscular shots of speed at the Beverly Hills Hotel, eyelashes, and LSD. It has a bizarre, utterly cringeworthy train wreck of an ending, yet, even on my third read was impossible to put down. In short: it is capital e Entertainment. Next time you see it in a used bookstore, pick it up and read it drunk in the tub.