Rating: 4 stars (Spotlight Review)
Bebe Baker never seems to catch a break. Abandoned by religion and cheated by the death of her father, everything she touches turns black—even her car has the taint of a surfer’s beach-front suicide.
The night she met Aaron, a jazz horn player, in the bar where she worked, Bebe thought opportunity finally found her. With nothing to lose, they ran off together whispering plans of heading to San Francisco.
A temporary detour lands them in Los Angeles where Bebe passes the time stripping in a seedy club by the airport, while they wait for the leader of Aaron’s band to pull himself together.
Through days of drug-fueled binges and nights contemplating broken dreams, Bebe can feel Aaron slipping further and further away. During a drunken, jealousy-fueled argument, Aaron blows through a red light. With a screech of tires and twist of metal Aaron is gone; leaving Bebe with the memory of his final moments.
Now in a half-way house, recovering from her addiction and infinite guilt, her scars—both mental and physical—are a constant reminder of everything she has lost. Days away from graduating cosmetology school, Bebe once again sets her sights on San Francisco. However, her intrinsic inability to allow herself even a small amount of happiness threatens her future for sobriety and redemption.
Bebe may be damaged and often makes bad choices, but its always with the best of intentions. So human and fallible, Bebe possesses an inner strength that occasionally finds its way to the surface despite her self-imposed triviality. The author throws little bits of herself into Bebe, which imparts a solid authenticity and unwavering soul to her persona.
Jillian Lauren’s writing has a velvety, visceral edge that compliments her beautifully descriptive prose that is guttural in its realism, yet soothing in its familiarity. Lauren is a truly gifted writer with the voice of a street-wise angel.
Pretty is tragically-heartbreaking, determinedly-inspiring and masterfully-written. As it was with her first book and memoir: Some Girls: My Life in a Harem, Lauren’s fictional debut proves, yet again, that she has what it takes to leave an indelible mark.
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Paperback: 288 pages
Publisher: Plume (August 30, 2011)
ISBN-13: 978-0452297340