At first glance So L.A. might draw you in with its gorgeous cover. It might entice you with its chick-lit feel. However I can promise you that what is in these pages is so much more than that. A mixture of dry satirical humor, and a no-holds-barred look at the culture that is L.A., this is a story that is hard to define. What I can say, is that it is brilliant.

I think it's fitting that I read this book while sitting in a 60 story sky rise in Downtown L.A. Overlooking the hub of the busiest parts of Wilshire Boulevard. This is the setting that Hoida chooses for her book, and it works wonders with Magdalena's story. From small town girl, to big city business owner, Magdalena's point of view is a fresh and honest take of the high society that is Beverly Hills. Her life is by no means perfect. Sure, she has the perfect shoes, the perfect house and even the perfect nose. She soon finds though, that all those things don't add up to a happy life.

It's honestly hard to like Magdalena because of how exasperating she can be sometimes. She is definitely a character that you want to save and slap in equal measures. Trying, and failing, to cope with the death of her brother is all that Magdalena does the majority of the book. However, it's definitely true to life. She tries to fill the gap with things, with fake people, with fake smiles. All the time falling deeper and deeper into the craziness that her life has become.

In the end So L.A. is about hiding from oneself. About changing what is on the outside to try to compensate for what's on the inside. I won't say that Magdalena's story is happy. It does show how easy it is to fall into a life that isn't your own. About how easy it is to feel lost, but hide it from the outside world. Briget Hoida's book may look like chick-lit at first glance, but it's infinitely more than that. I loved it, and I think you will too.
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The Short of It:

Never thought a book about the shallowness of Los Angeles could surprise me, but it did.

The Rest of It:

Magdalena wasn’t always a Botox-injected, Juicy Couture wearing gal. No, life before her designer water empire took off involved a vineyard in Northern California, a brother whom she absolutely adored and a simpler life; complete with a “tell it like it is” mother. But when her brother Junah dies tragically, she is completely and utterly destroyed. The only way to get through it, is to transform herself into someone other than herself. Maybe then she can leave the pain behind and at least pretend for a while that she isn’t some pathetic creature, pining away for a brother who will never pal around with her again.

Los Angeles is a lot of things to a lot of people but when you think of L.A., I bet you aren’t thinking depth or an abundance of intellect. Right? I mean, I was raised walking the streets of Hollywood (that sounds bad) so even as a little kid, I saw the transparent, plasticky nature of the town itself. It was bad then, but it’s even worse now. So, when I was asked to be a part of this tour my first reaction was a tiny cringe. Imperceptible, but there. However, I visited the author’s website to read an excerpt and I was quite taken with her writing. It was different. Sharp. Blunt. Edgy. Not predictable but shiny, like something you see on the ground that you have to pick-up. So, I signed up for the tour.

I. Am. So. Glad. I. Did.

When Magdalena comes up with the idea to bottle designer water. She, along with her husband Ricky, take-off for Los Angeles to build their empire. There, Ricky’s sister helps Magdalena become the person she wants to be and introduces her to designer clothing, expensive beauty treatments and saline implants. But when Magdalena begins to doubt if her marriage is really a happy one, suspicion sets in and Magdalena slowly plummets into depression where she’s left wondering if she will ever be whole again.

This is not chick-lit. It shares elements of what we’ve come to call chick-lit, but Magdalena is a very complex woman with real problems and although she’s wrapped herself in a protective shell, the pain she feels is woven throughout the entire novel as she goes through the five stages of grief (Denial, Anger, Reorganization, Depression & Acceptance).

At first, there is a lot of humor and name-dropping. Hoida sets the scene and really gives the reader a feel for L.A. Even if you’ve never stepped foot in So Cal, you’ll have a good idea of the L.A. that Mags lives in. The Beverly Hills lifestyle is in full-swing yet what makes it so appealing, is that you know right off that Mags isn’t into it. She is playing a part and between the parties and the shopping, her vulnerabilities come out in full force as evidenced by her affinity for gin and although she has some good people supporting her, none of them truly realize the severity of her depression.

I really liked this book. I liked it for a number of reasons but probably because it surprised the hell out of me. I didn’t expect to have a girl-crush on Magdalena but I have to tell you, I sort of did. Imagine the cuteness of Bridget Jones, the craziness of Suzanne Vale from Postcards from the Edge and the vulnerability of Holly Golightly from Breakfast at Tiffany’s. THAT is Magdalena.

I also didn’t expect the story to pack such an emotional punch. Her relationship with her brother and her memories of home were really quite sweet and at times, heartbreaking. No matter how glitzy the lifestyle, loss is loss and when it comes down to it, we are all imperfect humans trying to make the best of it.

I love it when a book surprises me in a good way and this one did just that.

For more reviews, visit my blog: Book Chatter. ( )

Summary
Magdalena de la Cruz and her husband Ricky have made their fortune in bottled water and are living in L.A. among the filthy rich and famous. Trips to the wax studio, power lunches, Pilates, gin, and business fill Magdalena's days until her brother Junah is killed in a climbing accident...an accident that Magdalana feels responsible for. Magdalena literally crawls under her bed for days and from there, her life begins to spiral out of control...retreating further and further within herself and physically re-constructing the outside.

What I Liked
The chapter structure - from one paragraph to 3 pages, the chapters are very short and sometimes just seem to be a stream of consciousness...always from Magdalena's point of view but jumping around in time as she explains her predicament and how she became a woman fighting within a woman. Magdalena's story is a complex one that would have been overwhelming I think without Hoida's smart style in getting us inside Magdalena's head.

The complications woven throughout the plot...death, grieving, self image, the other woman, plastic surgery, therapy, marriage, fidelity/infidelity, sexuality, money, dysfunctional families, friendship...you name it; it's here. While this complex of a plot could be cumbersome, it isn't in So L.A. Hoida never brings it all back into a neat little package because it can't be one...but she gives the reader enough information and enough insight to at least think about what the reader would do in Magdalena's shoes. So L.A. is so full of complications that I'm still thinking about it and trying out ideas as I get ready to post this review.

Puck - we'd all be lucky to have a true friend like Puck. Someone who believes in you no matter what and accepts you just the way you are...freaky drama included.

Quentin - I won't say too much about this character to keep from spoilers...but he's a good guy. Besides the obvious (and you'll find that out when you get to that part), I think he really wants to help Magdalena...but unlike everyone else around her, Quentin realizes that she must want to help herself first.

What I Didn't Like

No quotation marks - I'm an English teacher but this isn't just a mechanical issue for me. I really did have to re-read portions to make sure of who was saying what sometimes.

Magdalena - pulling the seams out of Ricky's clothes when she gets mad? about things she's just made up in her head???...there are times when Magdalena seems like nothing more than a spoiled brat. Reading about her sometimes was like watching a horror movie...everybody in the theatre knows what's going to happen when the young heroine decides to check into the old abandoned Bates Motel. I wanted to scream at Magdalena more than once and say, "You dummy...THINK about this decision for a minute or two!! Don't go THERE!!" But Magdalena goes there anyway. It's as if sometimes she's trying to make things just as bad as they can possibly be.

Ricky - I'm sorry...I really feel guilty for this...but I didn't like him. How in the world he put up with Magdalena for so long, I'll never understand. He's caught up in the L.A. lifestyle even more so than she is...and maybe that's how he does it. But, I just couldn't see it.

Overall Recommendation

So L.A. is an intense look at the "power" of reinvention in a culture that values the outside of a person more than the inside...a Stepford Wives kind of culture that is L.A. as described by Hoida. How can someone deal with real life in a world that is so make believe?? So L.A. is not a happy story by any stretch of the imagination...but neither is the issue of stripping self image from individuals based on what others deem worthy...in any situation but especially not in Magdalena's. What complicates this story even more is that Magdalena de la Cruz seems to choose a fabricated way of life in order to retreat into herself and protect herself from her grief...letting the outside world see a "costume" of sorts instead of who she truly is...possibly even a psychic protective measure after the trauma of Junah's death and her perceived role in the accident.
Deep stuff this is.
The language and a few graphic sex scenes/fantasies would keep me from recommending this to everyone...it doesn't bother me and I never felt that any of the scenes or language were gratuitous; I was shocked from time to time, but I think that was the point. The rawness helps the reader see and even feel how deeply Magdalena is falling into her own trap. ( )

The construction of Bridget Hoida’s debut novel, So L.A., consciously mimics that of the art form for which the city is best known: the movies. The book’s five sections are “takes,” the chapter titles would be appropriate to a screenplay, the physical descriptions are vivid and detailed, and the acknowledgements pages are (cleverly, I thought) presented in the style of film credits. And like some movies, the tone veers abruptly from comic to dramatic, and from down-to-earth to “what planet is this?”--it’s frustrating at times, and you wonder what it might have been if it had just settled down. But it’s compulsively watchable (or in this case, readable), and there’s enough good stuff in it that you’ll be interested to see what this writer/director does next.

Los Angeles is a city whose biggest industry is built on make-believe (and yes, that includes “reality” TV) and whose related mythology is based on self-reinvention, and Hoida’s Magdalena de la Cruz seems to be embracing it. She inhabits the glittery, status-conscious, idle-rich world that both promotes and feeds that myth--the “L.A.” that many people who know this city only from its entertainment products may think is the real thing, but that relatively few of its residents ever approach. Unlike many, Magdalena didn’t come here to act; she and her husband Ricky struck it rich in bottled water, and they moved from their home in the agricultural San Joaquin Valley to cultivate this prime market. But there’s no question that during most of the time they’ve lived in Southern California, Magdalena has been acting out--transforming herself physically and behaviorally--driven by deep emotional conflicts perpetuated by the sudden death of her beloved brother two years earlier.

The sources of Magdalena’s conflicts are gradually revealed; they’re also responsible for the novel’s frequent tonal shifts. Magdalena just might be an unreliable narrator--I’m not completely sure Hoida intended her to be, but I enjoyed the novel more once I stopped fully trusting what the character was telling me. Oddly, it made her voice more authentic to me.

Bridget Hoida shows talent and promise as a novelist, but So L.A. is a bit of a misfit. It seems to want to be a lightweight, breezy beach read, but it’s got a bit too much darkness and complexity underneath for that. I found it a sometimes frustrating, deeply moving in spots, occasionally nonsensical, and consistently interesting...come to think of it, it really might be pretty L.A. itself. ( )