It starts with a popstar. Adriana Argento’s newest single plays over the speakers at a drive bar and our narrator finds herself obsessed. With only a day job at a brainless women’s lifestyle website, our narrator soon finds herself obsessed with an online fandom watching every move Adriana makes. Normally hiding in the bathroom with her cat mug and coffee, our narrator soon finds a colleague who shares her obsession. Meghan invites the narrator to join her group of adult Adriana super fans called the Ivies. The Ivies make Harry Styles fans look like they have no devotion at all. They host parties where they worship Adrianna’s music in candlelight and chant the lyrics. When Adriana’s new singles start to come out to preview her new “very personal” album, the Ivies show their discontent with Adriana’s life, her boyfriend, and the fact that they are no in her inner circle. When the narrator discovers the depths of the Ivies’ madness, she finds that she may also be in serious danger.
Fan Club is a smart, fascinating look at obsessive fandom and the dangers of social media and the obsession with the lives of people that we think we know. Author Erin Mayer’s prose flows brilliantly, making Fan Club a book that is easy to fall headlong into. It is fascinating looking at how it can be so easy for modern fans to learn nearly every single detail about a celebrity but often forget that the object of their obsession is in fact a person with their own thoughts, actions and feelings. We see a sense of how our narrator, like many in cults before them, clings to belonging in a group, even if she is terrified of what they may do.
Fan Club is available today from Mira Publishing.
