Limelight by Amy Poeppel

The Story

When the Brinkley family left Dallas for Manhattan, Allison had stars in her eyes, dreaming of the excitement and romance of living in the city.

Reality soon set in: their apartment was cramped, the kids had adjustment problems, and finding work as a teacher proved problematic. Even her fashion sense is out of sync. 

While her husband Michael appears on Humans of New York, Allison struggles with one problem after another. The moms gathering at the school shut her out. Her one NYC friend from college days is her opposite: single, childless, fierce, self-confident, inappropriate, and brass. But she also knows what it takes to survive in the city.

"But here we were, barely over a week in, and so far, life in Manhattan was making one kid a pervert, one a depressive, and the other an asshole."

Then, an accident brings Allison crashing into the life of spoiled, teenage pop star Carter Reid and her motherly instincts take over. Allison finds her Teacher-Mom inner superhero. 

Can good parenting, discipline, tough love, and a support system turn around the alcohol- and drug-addled, promiscuous, angry boy? Carter is under contract to perform in a new musical based on Charles Chaplin's movie Limelight, but he is on track to crash and burn.

"All I knew...was that there was a badly injured, wildly famous teenager who was completely unsupervised and alone...What I wanted to know was why wasn't anyone looking after him."

My Reaction

Poepple has written a very funny novel, with some hilarious scenes and character insights. "The subway smelled like pee," Allison thinks, and I was transported back to my mass transit days. I could smell those subway steps. 

The further into the novel I got, the more addicted I was. I loved the characters along the way, such as the 'butler' Owen, pronounced 'Wen, and Allison's adult student Howard who doesn't understand poetry. Daughter Charlotte plays a major role as a teenager unimpressed by Carter's fame but who can speak his language. 

Along the way, she extols the virtues of family, positive support, educating for content, and understanding the teenage mind by looking past the behavior to discover the conflict beneath. 

Getting Personal

Moving, well, as much as I hate using the word, moving sucks. I know. I moved as a child, then twelve times as an adult, plus I saw our son's adjustment to a move. Relocation involves starting over in a foreign territory, creating a new support system of friends by breaking into concrete-set cliques. 

The Brinkley family's experience rings true. Was it a good idea? What happened to my kid's grades, why the behavior problems? Why don't my skills and experience translate into the new work culture? In my experience, it takes two years to adjust. The Brinkley's did it in one.

I did not know any of the pop music quotes at the chapter beginnings. But I am very familiar with Charles Chaplin's 1952 movie Limelight.

Mom had a 45 record of an orchestral presentation of The Song From Limelight, the Terry Theme 'Eternally.'  I loved it, the wistful and hopeful rise of the music, the violin's plaintive voice just before the end. As a young adult, I had the chance to see the film on the large screen at a West Philadelphia repertoire movie theater near the University of Pennsylvania. 

Sheet music for the Academy Award-winning Theme from Limelight

Calvero: That's all any of us are: amateurs. We don't live long enough to be anything else. from Limelight

Fame, celebrity, and show business are at the heart of Limelight. An aging thespian, played by Chaplin, discovers Terry, played by Claire Bloom, a wannabe ballerina, who has tried to kill herself because she could no longer walk. He nurses her back into health and mental wholeness. She believes she loves him. Chaplin has a chance at a comeback but finds the role is an act of charity. Meanwhile, he learns that Terry had helped a struggling musician, played by Sidney Chaplin, who loves her.

Carter Reid was hired to play the romantic, young musician, who he considers a loser.

"Life can be wonderful if you aren't afraid of it." Calvero in Limelight

Claire Bloom and Charles Chaplin in Limelight
https://www.moma.org/explore/inside_out/2012/04/24/charles-chaplins-limelight/

Chaplin's movie has its comic moments, beginning with Calvero's drunken walk home, an act Chaplin had perfected as a youngster in the Music Halls. But the overall impression is serious and personal, a look into the soul of the actor.

"Time is the great author. It always writes the perfect ending," a character in Poepple's novel quotes from Limelight.

And Poepple's Limelight has a perfect ending, too.

I received a free ebook from the publisher through NetGalley.

I have the author's previous novel Small Admissions on my Kindle and now I can't wait to read it!

Limelight: A Novel
by Amy Poeppel
Atria Books
Pub Date 01 May 2018   |
ISBN 9781501176371
PRICE $26.00 (USD)