Summer Reading Challenge: Star Craving Mad by Elise Miller

This summer, members of the Vise Library are participating in a Summer Reading Challenge. We have received copies of several books from publishers for honest reviews. We hope that you enjoy these reviews (and books)!

This week's book is Star Craving Mad by Elise Miller.

About the book:

Single, adorable Maddy, a 30-year-old teacher at a Manhattan private school, must come back down to earth when she gets a little star struck by her students' celebrity parents.

Maddy is a first grade teacher at a private school in New York.  She is a single mother and she is also very lonely.  There is a new student (Lola) in Maddy's class that has Maddy starstruck.  The student's father, Nic, is someone famous and Maddy can't quit thinking about him.  Before she knows it, her fantasies are becoming a reality when she starts a love affair with Nic (who is married).  Maddy is forced to hide their relationship and then starts second guessing the relationship.  She feels guilty about what this will do to Lola and how it is affecting her relationships with her family and friends.  Maddy is hard not to like even though she is doing something extremely inappropriate.  The relationship with Nic is not smooth sailing by any mean and Maddy does have a conscience.  You get to see how Maddy gets caught up into something big and it all feels so out of control.  Because she is so infatuated with Nic, she almost misses out on something better.  What makes this relationship even crazier is that Maddy even ends up spending time with Nic's wife Shelby.  Maddy eventually has to deal with the consequences of her relationship with Nic, but she almost ends up losing something she has worked so hard for.  

Buy the book:

     Amazon

       

About the author:

Elise A. Miller discovered her talent and passion for writing by accident, during a short-lived but rigorous acting pursuit in the late 1990s. She immediately began studying writing in earnest at Gotham Writers' Workshop in New York City, and hasn't looked back since. Elise completed courses in advanced fiction, memoir, novel writing, stand-up comedy and screenwriting. In 2000, she published her first piece in The Sun Magazine, and in 2002 she was one of the founding members of Little Red Writing Group in Brooklyn.

In the early 00s, Elise hosted and curated New York City's East Side Oral (the reading series your mother warned you about), which showcased the talents of Jonathan Ames, Ned Vizzini, Amy Sohn, Darin Strauss, Alix Strauss, Felicia Sullivan, Mike Albo, Kim Brittingham, Victoria C. Rowan, Rachel Kramer Bussell, Allen Salkin and many more.

Elise's first novel, Star Craving Mad, was published by Warner Books in 2004. In 2008, her personal essay Forgive Me was published in the anthology Because I Love Her. Other personal essays have been published on nerve.com, Papotage and Fresh Yarn. Chapters from her forthcoming novel have been published on Northern Liberties Review, Elephant Journal and in Wild River Review. A new and improved version of Star Craving Mad is being released in August, 2015 by SparkPress, the coolest hybrid pub-co and PR firm in the universe. 

Elise lives in Lower Merion, Pennsylvania with her husband, two kids and two teeny rescue dogs. She blogs about everything and anything at elisemiller.com.

Connect with the author:
Twitter

   Website