Cause Celeb by Helen Fielding

 

CAUSE CELEB is kind of like if someone thought, I want another CATCH-22, but I want it to be about refugee camps instead of war, and also, make it chick-lit. And to that effect, it's actually a pretty decent book. In some ways, it actually ages better than BRIDGET JONES because of the author's prescience about celebrity endorsements and influencer culture. She brutally satirizes virtue-signaling and the rather callous way that people view impoverished countries (if I don't personally see the starving children on my TV set, then suffering doesn't exist to me, etc.) and people's need to be recognized for giving.

There are a couple things that date this book-- an off-the-cuff insult about lesbians and a reference to President Reagan and Michael Jackson-- but for the most part, everything the author says in this book could probably still hold true today. How sad is that?

P.S. Speaking of sad, the way I welled up when the heroine saw all those starving people huddled by the mountain was just-- brutal.

3 out of 5 stars