Honey

A Novel

By: Isabel Banta

Narrated by: Brittany Pressley

A coming-of-age story that follows the meteoric rise of singer Amber Young as she navigates fame in the late-90s and early-2000s era of pop music superstardom

It is 1997, and Amber Young has received a life-changing call. It’s a chance thousands of girls would die for: the opportunity to join girl group Cloud9 in Los Angeles and escape her small town. She quickly finds herself in the orbits of fellow rising stars Gwen Morris, a driven singer-dancer, and Wes Kingston, a member of the biggest boy band in the world, ETA.

As Amber embarks on her solo career and her fame intensifies, her rich interior life is frequently reduced. Surrounded by people who claim to love her but only wish to exploit her and driven by a desire for recognition and success, for love and sex, for agency and connection, Amber comes of age at a time when the kaleidoscope of public opinion can distort everything and one mistake can shatter a career.

With the captivating style of Stephanie Danler’s Sweetbitter and the raw honesty of Jennette McCurdy’s I’m Glad My Mom Died, Isabel Banta’s debut novel, Honey, redefines the narratives of some of the most famous pop icons of the ’90s and 2000s. It reimagines the superstars we idolized and hated, oversexualized and underestimated, and gives them the fresh, multifaceted story they deserve.

A Macmillan Audio production from Celadon Books.

©2024 Isabel Banta (P)2024 Macmillan Audio

Critic reviews

"Honey is a sexy swagger of a debut. The ambition and grit of its heroine are matched by the dextrous smarts of its writer, and it is deeply satisfying to see the mistreated pop princesses of the millennium get the respect that they—as complicated humans—deserved all along."—Emma Straub, New York Times bestselling author of This Time Tomorrow

“Isabel Banta has delivered an all-access pass to the early-aughts pop world of my dreams in the form of this gorgeous, powerful, and unapologetic romp of a novel. Dripping with sweat, sex, and yes, honey, the character of Amber Young will forever redefine how we think of the perils of stardom, paparazzi, and becoming who you’re meant to be despite it all. Effervescent and full of energy, the lessons in Honey are as needed today as they were in the age of Y2K pop. A rare, shining star of a debut.”—Chelsea Bieker, author of Godshot and Madwoman

"Honey parts the shimmered curtains of Y2K pop stardom and ushers us to a place beyond the schoolgirl/jezebel binary: the rich inner world of a young woman discovering her own depth and life force, authentic sexuality and artistic intelligence. Show up for Honey with your sticky notes ready, because there's much to bookmark here: not only the deftly written heat, but a hundred keen and quotable observations about creating a life of truth and wholeness."—June Gervais, author of Jobs for Girls with Artistic Flair

Fantastic Debut!

Excellent character development & dialogue, and wonderful narrator. Fun read for those of us who were born in the 70s or 80s.

It’s about music, but no hook

I found this book boring . It’s a story there is just a story and not much special or interesting about it.

The performance was amazing!

The entire story was at times heartbreaking, but it had such a raw, real feel to it. Anyone who was a fan of pop idols in the 90s, 2000s should read this book!

A great telling of young stardom

This was really good. I enjoyed the ups and downs of Amber’s life and the stardom she went after.

Hard to listen to.

This was not a good book. I struggled to finish it. It really had no content. No beginning. No end. No middle. Just blah!