There was a moment near the mid-point of the novel that made me think we were headed for 5 stars. I knew pretty early on that there were some rambling structural problems, but there were some really depressing moments of this novel that were quite funny. That's hard to pull off and I want to give credit for that. With the occasional allegorical bits, I was reminded of Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita.

Also, I read Ferguson's autobiography a year or two ago and, while I think he's charming and interesting and funny, I wasn't impressed with that book. Hard to say of someone's life story that it was derivative, but so it seemed to me. So my expectations were for light-hearted 'not much' in his novel.

I guess I would put this in the strongly recommended 3-star category. There's some ham-handed Hollywood satire. There's some blatant repetition of 'the message'. There are some really lovely moments that are heart-felt and rude at the same time which makes me think Ferguson could become a really good writer.