Publisher's Weekly
Neither the frenzied world of rock 'n' roll nor the outsized Texas mentality are portrayed well enough to lift Ryan's seventh novel a step above pedestrian. C.C. McCarty was a poor boy from West Dallas who became an overnight singing sensation in the '50s. Taught by a woman who gave vocal and sexual instruction in the nude, C.C. learned to sing with a highly charged sensuality that drove the young girls crazy. Similarly moved was the venal young president of a record company, Valentina Trent, who quickly offered C.C. a contract and herself. Turning down both, the young star made an enemy for life. He has another in Ryker Rawley, whose sister, pregnant after a one-nighter with C.C., died from a botched abortion. Oblivious to the evil intentions of these people in his past, C.C. marries a Dallas deb, fathers his much-loved Laura, and then, through the machinations of fame and Valentina's continuing vengeance, dies from addiction to pills and booze. Soon after, teenaged Laura is seduced and brutalized by Ryker; later she determines to forgo her own singing ambitions to regain control of C.C's company from Valentina. Exclusive brand names, an excess of adjectives, a formulaic plot and cartoon-flat characters performing sudden frantic sex at every opportunity characterize this would-be blockbuster.

Genre: Romance