15+ Books About Actresses | aka if you liked evelyn hugo, you might like these books

Hey everyone!

Fame is an interesting concept. We often see it from afar and the reality always seems a lot darker. The exploration of emotions always intrigues me, I think the combination of the epitome of luxury combined with darkness is haunting in a way you can’t look away from. It is open and secretive, it is happy and sad, it is success and failure.

One of the most popular releases for books about actresses would be the famed Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo. So if, like me, you read this one and fancied more stories about actresses/fame, here is your list. Enjoy!

🎼 25+ Books about Music | aka if you liked daisy jones and the six, you might like these books

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the seven husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid

It makes sense to start with the legend. The entire life story of a famous fictional actress; how she succeeded, the type of people she met along the way and the biggest challenges. If you like ambitious characters, messy journeys and love stories, please read this book and promise you’ll tell me what you loved (or hated) about it.

🎬 The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo | What makes this book SO good?

– about the book –

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genre: historical, romance

Ageing and reclusive Hollywood movie icon Evelyn Hugo is finally ready to tell the truth about her glamorous and scandalous life. But when she chooses unknown magazine reporter Monique Grant for the job, no one is more astounded than Monique herself. Why her? Why now?

Monique is not exactly on top of the world. Her husband has left her, and her professional life is going nowhere. Regardless of why Evelyn has selected her to write her biography, Monique is determined to use this opportunity to jumpstart her career.

Summoned to Evelyn’s luxurious apartment, Monique listens in fascination as the actress tells her story. From making her way to Los Angeles in the 1950s to her decision to leave show business in the ‘80s, and, of course, the seven husbands along the way, Evelyn unspools a tale of ruthless ambition, unexpected friendship, and a great forbidden love. Monique begins to feel a very real connection to the legendary star, but as Evelyn’s story nears its conclusion, it becomes clear that her life intersects with Monique’s own in tragic and irreversible ways.

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The Comeback by Ella Berman

A common theme in stories about famous people is the abuse of power that often surrounds them. This story seems to focus on an actress’ relationship with a director and reclaiming her life/story back. I am always ready for a book surrounding the power of a woman’s voice and justice.

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genre: literary fiction, mystery

Grace Turner was one movie away from Hollywood’s A-List. So no one understood why, at the height of her career and on the eve of her first Golden Globe nomination, she disappeared.

Now, one year later, Grace is back in Los Angeles and determined to reclaim her life on her own terms.

So when Grace is asked to present a lifetime achievement award to director Able Yorke—the man who controlled her every move for eight years—she knows there’s only one way she’ll be free of the secret that’s already taken so much from her.

The Comeback is a powerful and provocative story of justice in the #MeToo era—a true page-turner about a young woman finding the strength and power of her voice.

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shooting Martha by David Thewlis

If you’ve been around here for a while, you may have heard me mention my struggles with mystery stories, but the tangle of fame and another character acting as the deceased actress to finish the film has my curiosity.

– about the book –

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genre: literary fiction, mystery

Celebrated director Jack Drake can’t get through his latest film (his most personal yet) without his wife Martha’s support. The only problem is, she’s dead…

When Jack sees Betty Dean – actress, mother, trainwreck – playing the part of a crazed nun on stage in an indie production of The Devils, he is struck dumb by her resemblance to Martha. Desperate to find a way to complete his masterpiece, he hires her to go and stay in his house in France and resuscitate Martha in the role of ‘loving spouse’.

But as Betty spends her days roaming the large, sunlit rooms of Jack’s mansion – filled to the brim with odd treasures and the occasional crucifix – and her evenings playing the part of Martha over scripted video calls with Jack, she finds her method acting taking her to increasingly dark places.

And as Martha comes back to life, she carries with her the truth about her suicide – and the secret she guarded until the end.

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the view Was exhausting by Mikaella Clements & Onjuli Datta

This novel sounds part rom-com plot, part drama. It can be a tricky mix to combine but the magic of fake dating gives me high hopes. Plus, the conversations surrounding the industry itself will add a lot to the novel.

– about the book –

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genre: romance

Faking a love story is a whole lot easier than being in love . . .

The world can see that international A-list actress Whitman (“Win”) Tagore and jet-setting playboy Leo Milanowski are made for each other. Their kisses start Twitter trends and their fights break the internet. From red-carpet appearances to Met Gala mishaps, their on-again, off-again romance has titillated the public and the press for almost a decade. But it’s all a lie.

As a woman of colour, Win knows the Hollywood deck is stacked against her, so she’s perfected the art of controlling her public persona. Whenever she nears scandal, she calls in Leo, with his endearingly reckless attitude, for a staged date. Each public display of affection shifts the headlines back in Win’s favour, and Leo uses the good press to draw attention away from his dysfunctional family.

Pretending to be in a passionate romance is one thing, but Win knows that a real relationship would lead to nothing but trouble. So instead they settle for friendship, with a side of sky-rocketing chemistry. Except this time, on the French Riviera, something is off. A shocking secret in Leo’s past sets Win’s personal and professional lives on a catastrophic collision course. Behind the scenes of their yacht trips and PDA, the world’s favourite couple is at each other’s throats. Now they must finally confront the many truths and lies of their relationship, and Win is forced to consider what is more important: a rising career, or a risky shot at real love?

The View Was Exhausting is a funny, wickedly observant modern love story set against the backdrop of exotic locales and the realities of being a woman of colour in a world run by men.

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Valley of the dolls by Jacqueline Susann

This book turned film is revered as a classic but I will admit I hadn’t heard of it until recently. Following three friends each with their own relationship to fame and drugs. I think having multiple voices in one story allows a variety of approaches to discussions which when done well is a powerful reading experience.

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genre: classic, contemporary

Valley of the Dolls took the world by storm when it was first published, fifty years ago. Never had a book been so frank about sex, drugs and show business. It is often sited as the bestselling novel of all time.

Dolls: red or black; capsules or tablets; washed down with vodka or swallowed straight for Anne, Neely, and Jennifer, it doesn’t matter, as long as the pill bottle is within easy reach. These three women become best friends when they are young and struggling in New York City and then climb to the top of the entertainment industry only to find that there is no place left to go but down into the Valley of the Dolls.

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delayed rays of a star by Amanda lee Koe

Similar to the novel previous, this story follows three women in the industry… but during 1928; two actresses and a director. I love that the synopsis discusses how womanhood is seen in the light and how it questions ego, desire and differences. This is a book I would love to read; it seems like a perfect combination of entertainment and important discussions.

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genre: historical

A dazzling novel following the lives of three groundbreaking women–Marlene Dietrich, Anna May Wong, and Leni Riefenstahl–cinema legends who lit up the twentieth century.

At a chance encounter at a Berlin soirée in 1928, the photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt captures three very different women together in one frame: up-and-coming German actress Marlene Dietrich, who would wend her way into Hollywood as one of its lasting icons; Anna May Wong, the world’s first Chinese American star, playing for bit parts while dreaming of breaking away from her father’s modest laundry; and Leni Riefenstahl, whose work as a director would first make her famous–then, infamous.

From this curious point of intersection, Delayed Rays of a Star lets loose the trajectories of these women’s lives. From Weimar Berlin to LA’s Chinatown, from a seaside resort in East Germany to a luxury apartment on the Champs-Élysées, the different settings they inhabit are as richly textured as the roles they play: siren, muse, predator, or lover, each one a carefully calibrated performance. And in the orbit of each star live secondary players–a Chinese immigrant housemaid, a German soldier on leave from North Africa, a pompous Hollywood director–whose voices and viewpoints reveal the legacy each woman left in her own time, as well as in ours.

Amanda Lee Koe’s playful, wry prose guides the reader dexterously around murky questions of ego, persona, complicity, desire, and difference. Intimate and raw, Delayed Rays of a Star is a visceral depiction of womanhood–its particular hungers, its calculations, and its eventual betrayals–and announces a bold new literary voice.

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Siren Queen by Nghi Vo

A fantasy approach to the monsters of Hollywood?! Say no more. Bonus, sarcasm!

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genre: historical, fantasy

“No maids, no funny talking, no fainting flowers.” Luli Wei is beautiful, talented, and desperate to be a star. Coming of age in pre-Code Hollywood, she knows how dangerous the movie business is and how limited the roles are for a Chinese American girl from Hungarian Hill—but she doesn’t care. She’d rather play a monster than a maid.

But in Luli’s world, the worst monsters in Hollywood are not the ones on screen. The studios want to own everything from her face to her name to the women she loves, and they run on a system of bargains made in blood and ancient magic, powered by the endless sacrifice of unlucky starlets like her. For those who do survive to earn their fame, success comes with a steep price. Luli is willing to do whatever it takes—even if that means becoming the monster herself.

Siren Queen offers up an enthralling exploration of an outsider achieving stardom on her own terms, in a fantastical Hollywood where the monsters are real and the magic of the silver screen illuminates every page.

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Reel by Kennedy Ryan

Kennedy Ryan is a well-loved romance author who I’ve wanted to read for a while. This book focuses on an actress’ rise into stardom and the love story alongside it. The tagline says artistic obsession and unrelenting love; which sounds perfect. It reminds me a little of “A Star is Born”.

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genre: romance

A brand-new series with a Hollywood tale of wild ambition, artistic obsession, and unrelenting love.

For months I stood by, an understudy waiting in the wings, preparing for my time to shine. I never imagined he would watch in the audience that night. Canon Holt. Famous film director. Fascinating. Talented. Fine.

Before I could catch my breath, everything changed. I went from backstage Broadway to centre-stage Hollywood. From being unknown to my name, Neevah Saint, on everyone’s lips. Canon casts me in a star-studded Harlem Renaissance biopic, catapulting me into another stratosphere.

But stars shine brightest in the dead of night. Forbidden attraction, scandal and circumstances beyond my control jeopardize my dream. Could this one shot — the role of a lifetime, the love of a lifetime — cost me everything?

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Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter

A story about falling in love with a dying actress. Shot in two timelines. The synopsis doesn’t give much more away but it provides enough to intrigue me as it initially sounds conventional yet there is a mystery aspect.

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genre: historical, romance

The story begins in 1962. Somewhere on a rocky patch of the sun-drenched Italian coastline a young innkeeper, chest-deep in daydreams, looks out over the incandescent waters of the Ligurian Sea and views an apparition: a beautiful woman, a vision in white, approaching him on a boat. She is an American starlet, he soon learns, and she is dying.

And the story begins again today, half a world away in Hollywood, when an elderly Italian man shows up on a movie studio’s back lot searching for the woman he last saw at his hotel fifty years before.

Gloriously inventive, funny, tender and constantly surprising, Beautiful Ruins is a novel full of fabulous and yet very flawed people, all of them striving towards another sort of life, a future that is both delightful and yet, tantalizingly, seems just out of reach.

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Meet Me in Monaco by Hazel Gaynor & Heather Webb

A story inspired by Grace Kelly all about fame, love and friendship. Perfect for fans of the actress and princess. I don’t know much about Ms Kelly, but this sounds like a story I would adore. As this is based on real life, with the same name, I do question whether it is will be respectable as it bends truths to fit this story. One to look at the reviews for I think.

– about the book –

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genre: historical, romance

Set in the 1950s against the backdrop of Grace Kelly’s whirlwind romance and glamourous wedding to Prince Rainier of Monaco, New York Times bestselling author Hazel Gaynor and Heather Webb take the reader on an evocative sun-drenched journey along the Côte d’Azur in this page-turning novel of passion, fate, and second chances.

Movie stars and paparazzi flock to Cannes for the glamorous film festival, but Grace Kelly, the biggest star of all, wants only to escape from the flash-bulbs. When struggling perfumer Sophie Duval shelters Miss Kelly in her boutique, fending off a persistent British press photographer, James Henderson, a bond is forged between the two women and sets in motion a chain of events that stretches across thirty years of friendship, love, and tragedy.

James Henderson cannot forget his brief encounter with Sophie Duval. Despite his guilt at being away from his daughter, he takes an assignment to cover the wedding of the century, sailing with Grace Kelly’s wedding party on the SS Constitution from New York. In Monaco, as wedding fever soars and passions and tempers escalate, James and Sophie—like Princess Grace—must ultimately decide what they are prepared to give up for love.

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The Stand-In by Lily Chu

Hurray. Another book I have actually read and one where we follow a “normal” girl pretending to be an actress on occasion to help relieve the stresses of the job. It is a book I would describe as the perfect, heartfelt rom-com. I really enjoyed it! A strong romance and an easily delicious plot. *chef’s kiss*

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genre: romance, contemporary

Gracie Reed is doing just fine. Sure, she was fired by her overly “friendly” boss, and yes she still hasn’t gotten her mother into the nursing home of their dreams, but she’s healthy, she’s (somewhat) happy, and she’s (mostly) holding it all together.

But when a mysterious SUV pulls up beside her, revealing Chinese cinema’s golden couple Wei Fangli and Sam Yao, Gracie’s world is turned on its head. The famous actress has a proposition: due to their uncanny resemblance, Fangli wants Gracie to be her stand-in. The catch? Gracie will have to be escorted by Sam, the most attractive—and infuriating—man Gracie’s ever met.

If it means getting the money she needs for her mother, Gracie’s in. Soon Gracie moves into a world of luxury she never knew existed. But resisting Sam, and playing the role of an elegant movie star, proves more difficult than she ever imagined—especially when she learns the real reason Fangli so desperately needs her help. In the end, all the lists in the world won’t be able to help Gracie keep up this elaborate ruse without losing herself…and her heart.

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Starring Adele Astaire by Eliza Knight

Following a dancer this time so I’ve taken flexibility with the word actress, but fame is the keyword. Adele Astaire (sister to Fred Astaire) wants to have a dance career and a family life, and Violet Wood will do anything to become a famous dancer. I am interested in exploring the dance industry in the 1920s and seeing two different women’s outlooks towards it.

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genre: historical

A story full of glitz and glam as she delves into the life of Adele Astaire, a spirited and talented woman who served up smiles and love both on and off the stage—with and without her also famous brother Fred Astaire— along with a determined young dancer with rags-to-riches dreams.

A spirited rising stage star. Adele Astaire was a glittering, glamorous star, dancing with her brother, Fred, endearing herself to audiences from New York to London. But although she is toasted by royalty and beloved by countless fans, Adele Astaire has dreams of a loving husband and a houseful of children. And when she meets Lord Charles Cavendish, her wishes may just come true—but at what cost?

A determined young dancer. Ever since Violet Wood could walk she’s wanted to dance on the London stage. Befriended by Adele, filled with ambition, she is more than willing to make the sacrifices it will take to become a star herself, and her rags-to-riches hopes are within reach. But the road to fame is never easy.

Two women with unquenchable spirits. From the fast-paced world of roaring 20s New York to the horrors and sacrifice of wartime London, Adele’s and Violet’s lives intertwine, and each must ask themselves is fame worth the price you must pay?

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Mercury Pictures Presents by Anthony Marra

This book focuses on the industry as we follow an associate producer of Mercury Pictures. It talks about the job, the challenges and home life. I think it builds a strong character premise and I’d love to explore the journey she goes on. Not only that but the story has lots of layers from mystery, job politics and conversations about immigration.

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genre: historical

Like many before her, Maria Lagana has come to Hollywood to outrun her past. Born in Rome, where every Sunday her father took her to the cinema instead of church, Maria immigrates with her mother to Los Angeles after a childhood transgression leads to her father’s arrest.

Fifteen years later, on the eve of America’s entry into World War II, Maria is an associate producer at Mercury Pictures, trying to keep her personal and professional lives from falling apart. Her mother won’t speak to her. Her boss, a man of many toupees, has been summoned to Washington by congressional investigators. Her boyfriend, a virtuoso Chinese-American actor, can’t escape the studio’s narrow typecasting. And the studio itself, Maria’s only home in exile, teeters on the verge of bankruptcy.

Over the coming months, as the bright lights go dark across Los Angeles, Mercury Pictures becomes a nexus of European émigrés: modernist poets trying their luck as B-movie screenwriters, once-celebrated architects becoming scale-model miniaturists, and refugee actors finding work playing the very villains they fled. While the world descends into war, Maria rises through a maze of conflicting politics, divided loyalties, and jockeying ambitions. But when the arrival of a stranger from her father’s past threatens Maria’s carefully constructed facade, she must finally confront her father’s fate–and her own.

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The Only Woman In The Room by Marie Benedict

This story is about Hedy Lamarr, a famous actress and scientist (if only people would listen). Given that this is based on real life, it could have been an important chance to tell her story. However, the reviews often say it was a missed opportunity which is a shame. I have still included it as it felt like an important story to know regardless of whether you read this book or not.

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genre: historical

She was beautiful. She was a genius. Could the world handle both? A novel about Hedy Lamarr.

Hedy Kiesler is lucky. Her beauty leads to a starring role in a controversial film and marriage to a powerful Austrian arms dealer, allowing her to evade Nazi persecution despite her Jewish heritage. But Hedy is also intelligent. At lavish Vienna dinner parties, she overhears the Third Reich’s plans. One night in 1937, desperate to escape her controlling husband and the rise of the Nazis, she disguises herself and flees her husband’s castle.

She lands in Hollywood, where she becomes Hedy Lamarr, screen star. But Hedy is keeping a secret even more shocking than her Jewish heritage: she is a scientist. She has an idea that might help the country and that might ease her guilt for escaping alone—if anyone will listen to her.

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Radiance by Catherynne M. Valente

These last 3 books are the rogue suggestions and I am starting with the “roguest” of the rogues. A sci-fi following a filmmaker making documentaries about specific space civilisations. I think this is a unique way to experience a sci-fi adventure and explore a filmmaker’s craft. If you want a different read, this is certainly one.

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genre: sci-fi

Radiance is a decopunk pulp SF alt-history space opera mystery set in a Hollywood and solar system-very different from our own, from Catherynne M. Valente, the phenomenal talent behind the New York Times bestselling The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making.

Severin Unck’s father is a famous director of Gothic romances in an alternate 1946 in which talking movies are still a daring innovation due to the patent-hoarding Edison family. Rebelling against her father’s films of passion, intrigue, and spirits from beyond, Severin starts making documentaries, travelling through space and investigating the levitator cults of Neptune and the lawless saloons of Mars. For this is not our solar system, but one drawn from classic science fiction in which all the planets are inhabited and we travel through space on beautiful rockets. Severin is a realist in a fantastic universe.

But her latest film, which investigates the disappearance of a diving colony on a watery Venus populated by island-sized alien creatures, will be her last. Though her crew limps home to earth and her story is preserved by the colony’s last survivor, Severin will never return.

Told using techniques from reality TV, classic film, gossip magazines, and meta-fictional narrative, Radiance is a solar system-spanning story of love, exploration, family, loss, quantum physics, and silent film.

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The Autograph Man by Zadie Smith

The second rogue; following not an actress but a man who sells actresses’ autographs. This approach shows a different side to fame and I think it will bring forth a lot of themes and discussions which really interest me. Plus, Zadie Smith is an author I have been meaning to check out for years.

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genre: literary fiction, contemporary

Alex-Li Tandem sells autographs. His business is to hunt for names on paper, collect them, sell them, and occasionally fake them—all to give the people what they want: a little piece of Fame. But what does Alex want? Only the return of his father, the end of religion, something for his headache, three different girls, infinite grace, and the rare autograph of forties movie actress Kitty Alexander. With fries.

The Autograph Man is a deeply funny existential tour around the hollow trappings of modernity: celebrity, cinema, and the ugly triumph of symbol over experience. It offers further proof that Zadie Smith is one of the most staggeringly talented writers of her generation.

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Exit The Actress by Priya Parmar

The final rogue and book on this list. Taking historical to a new level and going pre-Hollywood to the 17th Century. The actress who was the mistress of King Charles the second, Nell Gwyn. I am interested in the role of an actress in this time era and the link to royal politics. The reviews are good for this one so fingers crossed.

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genre: historical, romance

While selling oranges in the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden, sweet and sprightly Ellen “Nell” Gwyn impresses the theatre’s proprietors with a wit and sparkle that belie her youth and poverty. She quickly earns a place in the company, narrowly avoiding the life of prostitution to which her sister has already succumbed. As her roles evolve from supporting to starring, the scope of her life broadens as well. Soon Ellen is dressed in the finest fashions, charming the theatrical, literary, and royal luminaries of Restoration England.

Ellen grows up on the stage, experiencing first love and heartbreak and eventually becoming the mistress of Charles II. Despite his reputation as a libertine, Ellen wholly captures his heart-and he hers-but even the most powerful love isn’t enough to stave off the gossip and bitter court politics that accompany a royal romance. Telling the story through a collection of vibrant seventeenth-century voices ranging from Ellen’s diary to playbills, letters, gossip columns, and home remedies, Priya Parmar brings to life the story of an endearing and delightful heroine.

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Have you read any of these books? Do you like books about actresses? Are you excited about the upcoming Evelyn Hugo movie?