Bring the house down: a novel

By the time the curtain comes down, infamous theater critic Alex Lyons knows his verdict - the performance deserves either a five-star rave or a one-star pan. On the opening night of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, he doesn't deliberate over the scathing one-star review he writes for Hayley Sinclair's show. Nor does he hesitate when the opportunity presents itself to have a one-night stand with the struggling actress. Unaware that she's gone home with the critic who's just written a career-ending review of her show, Hayley wakes up at his apartment to see his hatchet job in print on the kitchen table, and she's not sure which humiliation offends her the most. So she revamps her one-woman show into a viral sensation critiquing Alex Lyons himself - entitled son of a famous actress, serial philanderer, and by all accounts a terrible man. Yet Alex remains unapologetic. As his reputation goes up in flames, he insists on telling his unvarnished version of events to his colleague Sophie. Through her eyes, we see that the deeper she gets pulled into his downfall, the more conflicted she becomes. After all, there are always two sides to every story.