It’s for good reason that one of the earliest lines from the 1990 movie Pretty Woman is this one: “This is Hollywood, land of dreams.” The city is notorious for being a place where hopes of fame and success are as common as palm trees and fancy cars. It’s a place where dreams both come true spectacularly and are spectacularly shattered. Likewise, every great story begins with a dream, some kind of goal the main character is compelled to chase after, and if the story takes place in Tinsel Town—the infamous Dream Factory—the very setting gets to play a hugely supporting role. Here are six of my favorite books set in the one and only Hollywood.
Land of Dreams by Kate Kerrigan
This is the final book in Kerrigan’s fabulous Ellis Island trilogy, which features as its protagonist, Irish immigrant Ellie Hogan. I loved this series, but I am especially fond of Land of Dreams, which picks up Ellie’s pursuit of the American Dream in the 1940s from book two, City of Hope, when Ellie’s teenage son runs away from New York and heads to Hollywood, lured by the promise of fame and fortune. She goes after him and is soon swept up into the larger-than-life cosmos that defined Hollywood’s golden years. Kerrigan has a gentle touch, and her characters are so well-developed. You don’t have to start with book one, Ellis Island, but I’d recommend it.
Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter
Beautiful Ruins spans decades but includes 1960s Hollywood and the making of the film Cleopatra. I heard Jess Walter speak about this novel when it released in 2012 and I was so enthralled with how he described it, I started reading it that night. I was especially impressed with how Walter wove the multiple timelines into a seamless and absorbing narrative. The novel begins in 1962 at a coastal Italian inn where an American actress named Dee has arrived in ill health after having just shot the film Cleopatra with Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor. Then we shift to Los Angeles in 2001 where the lives of Claire, a struggling screenwriter, and Michael, a down-on-his-luck producer (working on a project that will uncover the truth behind Dee’s relationship with Burton) will converge. A persistent theme is that of the elusiveness of finding ultimate satisfaction in life and the fragility of love and romance. There’s dark humor in the pages, but also depth of insight.
West of Sunset by Stewart O’Nan
When I was preparing a few years back to write Stars Over Sunset Boulevard, I read Stewart O’Nan’s West of Sunset to get a feel for the for the world of 1930’s Hollywood. It was a sad read but I loved it. Here is a great book that fictionalizes F. Scott Fitzgerald’s final and hard years in Hollywood. Set in the early 1940s, this book shows us the famed writer of The Great Gatsby struggling with personal woes and a fading career. He’s not in great health and has complicated relationships with his daughter and his former wife, Zelda. O’Nan explores what it’s like to try to rebuild a life while contending with disillusionment, sickness, and these difficult relationships. It’s a novel about the temporal nature of fame, the cost of ambition, and the ache of personal decline—all set against the backdrop of Hollywood’s golden and best years. There’s definitely a sense of melancholy in the pages, but it’s not all sadness. There are moments of reflection on a life that gave much to the literary world.
Trouble is my Beat by James Scott Bell
If you’re in the mood for less emotionally heavy fare, like a collection of pulp-style, hardboiled detective novellettes, you will want to check out International Thrillers Writers Award winner James Scott Bell’s Trouble is My Beat. The stand-alone stories, featuring Hollywood private investigator Bill Armbrewster, all have the vibe of a Sam Spade or Philip Marlowe tale, and with all the large-than-life distinctives you’d expect from a pulp fiction look at Hollywood’s darker side. The noir feel is there but with more wit and humor, and even though there’s the necessary grit and grime in the pages, you can give this to your young teen to read (as in, you don’t need to worry about explicit content). And for a nice little bonus feature, Bell includes a Guide to 1940s Pulp Slang at the end of the book, which is plenty entertaining all on its own.
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid
This wildly popular novel by Taylor Jenkins Reid is the story of an aging Hollywood movie icon who decides to reveal long-held secrets to a novice magazine reporter. Cosmopolitan aptly says of it, “Come for the glam Old Hollywood vibes, stay for a touching tale of a young reporter and a silver screen legend.” I liked it (the audio version was wonderfully voiced) but if I could be so bold, I liked so much more Reid’s Daisy Jones and the Six. This novel is only merely Hollywood-adjacent, though, taking place in Los Angeles. The story, uniquely constructed in lines of conversation, follows the rise and fall of a 1970s rock band. Everything about it is perfect; I had to list it.
The Girls in the Picture by Melanie Benjamin
Melanie Benjamin has given us a superb, novelization of the friendship of early Hollywood legends Mary Pickford and Frances Marion in The Girls in the Picture. Melanie’s characters are always so richly drawn—no exception here—and she is a master at the deep research dive essential to pulling off a fictionalized look at the lives of two real-life people. The novel begins in the era of the silent film, when Mary Pickford was a beloved figure in Hollywood and Frances Marion was working as a screenwriter in a highly male-dominated industry. They develop a close friendship that deepens over time, and as the story progresses we see how both women are shaped by the ever-evolving film industry. They endure much as they both deal with heartbreak, loss, and the difficulties of growing older in an industry that esteems youth and beauty above all. Benjamin’s book is a salute to resilience, determination, and the power of friendship; which makes it a fitting novel with which to end this list: on a hopeful note. Yes, Hollywood can be an unforgiving place that is hard on dreams but the people you meet there, who become your allies and friends, they can ease the pain and help you dream again.
***
