Chapter Eight
Eight
“Stronger Alone is, without a doubt, the worst book I’ve ever read.”
That’s how Book Babe’s review of Melanie Joan’s memoir started.
It went downhill from there. Besides calling Melanie Joan a “tone-deaf, hyperprivileged narcissist who plays the victim in order to exploit the sympathy of her fans,” Book Babe singled out specific incidents from Stronger Alone to back up this thesis—from Melanie Joan’s “obvious exaggeration” of John Melvin’s abuse of her (“Nobody would be dumb enough to stay in the marriage she describes”) to her “villainization” of an unnamed actress Melanie Joan had wound up firing from the Netflix adaptation of A Girl and Not a God (“Of course Hall tries to make herself into the wronged one, just like she always does in this grim piece of garbage,” Book Babe wrote.
“But IMHO, that actress—more talented, intelligent, and good-hearted than this so-called author, I’m sure—has grounds for a lawsuit”).
Perhaps worst of all, Book Babe quoted Stronger Alone at length for laughs—which Blake said she didn’t do in any of her other reviews.
“Melanie Joan Hall can’t write—we all know that about her,” Book Babe concluded.
“But far worse than that is her complete lack of self-awareness. At least most hacks know what they are.”
I skimmed a few more of Book Babe’s reviews. Blake was right. Some were positive. Some were negative. But I couldn’t find a single one that was this deeply personal. Book Babe was someone who knew Melanie Joan. She was someone who’d been hurt by her, or by this book. Most likely both.
I called Melanie Joan. “I’m sorry,” I said.
“Oh, God, what now?” she said.
“I read the review,” I said. “In full.”
“Oh,” she said.
“I probably would have written a worse comment than you did,” I said. “In fact, I feel like writing one now.”
“Don’t,” Melanie Joan said. “I’m in enough trouble as it is.”
“I was just kidding,” I said. “Kind of.” I asked if she could email me the Stronger Alone manuscript.
Melanie Joan let out a mirthless laugh. “At least somebody will read it,” she said.
A few seconds after we hung up, I received an email from Melanie Joan with a PDF of the manuscript attached.
I opened it and started to read. It was better written than her romance novels, but still a little over-the-top for my taste.
I decided to write down all the names of the people she mentioned negatively, then try to figure out if any of them could be Book Babe.
One candidate jumped out right away—the unnamed actress, whom Melanie Joan referred to in the book as Tallulah Airhead. (If her readership was, as Woodrow had said, “aging out,” he might have tried suggesting a pop-culture reference that was less than a hundred years old.)
In any case, her final standoff with “Tallulah” was described in the book’s prologue:
As I approached her trailer, my heart pounded.
I’d already been through so much in my life—terror, trauma, debasement no woman should be forced to endure, most of it at the hands of people I thought I loved and trusted.
But none of it had prepared me for this moment—when I would come face-to-face with the person who was actively destroying my greatest creation, Cassandra Demeter—of A Girl and Not a God.
I had just watched the dailies. Not only was her acting an embarrassment (drinking and diet pills were rumored to have been involved), but she had rewritten blocks of dialogue without permission, turning my heroine into a simpering fool.
The ingratitude! I knocked on Tallulah’s door, though I hated showing her that courtesy.
If her trailer hadn’t been leased by my own production company, I’d have broken it down.
“Go away!” she called out. “I’m meditating.”
It was as if my entire life had prepared me for this moment—the burn of each indignity making me stronger. I was a sword forged in fire, ready to do battle. “You’re a disgrace,” I told her through the trailer door. “You’re destroying my life’s work. And you are fired.”
By the time she’d gotten off her meditation pillow and opened the door, I’d called security.
“Ouch,” I said.
A Girl and Not a God had been released on Netflix four years ago.
It had been quite a hit. The actress who’d apparently replaced Tallulah Airhead—a then-unknown by the name of Meredith Tanner—had won an Emmy.
I remembered calling Melanie Joan and congratulating her.
She’d never mentioned the fact that Meredith had been a pinch hitter, and why should she?
Melanie Joan Hall had won the game. Until, perhaps, now.
I called Melanie Joan.
“Who is Tallulah Airhead?” I said.
She made that sound again. Rosie jumped off my lap and scurried out of my office.