Luckiest Girl Alive book review|Lainey Gossip Books

If You’re not following Lainey Gossip, may I suggest that you do. It’s all about pop culture including books, fashion, movies, celebrities, etc. with lots of fun videos including this one of Tom Cruise thanking people for seeing his latest movie Top Gun: Maverick while free falling from an airplane and talking on his way down. It’s all about getting the shot says Lainey, and he sure does.

Here are a couple of posts from her site–and I mean who wouldn’t love a column titled Smutty Book Round-up?

Here’s short bio from her website

LaineyGossip.com is an entertainment news and gossip blog co-founded by Elaine “Lainey” Lui. The primary voice of LaineyGossip.com, she is also co-host of CTV’s daytime talk show “The Social”, and a reporter on CTV’s “etalk”, Canada’s number one rated entertainment news show.

The site started as an email to small group of friends and colleagues in 2003 and spread by word of mouth to thousands of now loyal readers. It launched as a website in December 2004 and has since grown into an immensely popular entertainment destination visited by over 1.5 million monthly unique readers. Generating over 18 million monthly page views, it is now a leading international celebrity gossip source and a must read for well-read, educated females across North America.

Aside from securing hot tips and exclusive party access on its own, the site has benefited from the access associated with Lainey’s role on CTV’s etalk, which she joined in 2006 as a special correspondent. With etalk Lainey has covered the Red Carpet at the Oscars, SuperBowl XLII, Cannes and Toronto International Film Festivals, and other top tier events worldwide.

In April of 2014 Lainey fulfilled a lifelong dream when her first book Listen to the Squawking Chicken: When a Mother Knows Best, What’s a Daughter to Do? A Memoir (Sort Of) was published (by Random House in Canada and Penguin in the USA).

Bored yet? If not, below is a selection of clippings from a handful of magazines and newspapers over the past few years.

Need more? See the our full bio here (PDF format) or email press@laineygossip.com for more information.
Buzzfeed, April 2021
Perez Hilton And Lainey Gossip Were Famous For Their Mean Blogs. Now They’re Trying To Change.
By Saachi Koul

ELLE

Every day after I came home from high school, I’d run to my bedroom, turn on my enormous, whirring black Dell desktop, and read Perez Hilton — the up-to-the-minute celebrity gossip blog — for hours. Paparazzi hunting young famous women and bloggers updating their whereabouts by the second created the feeling that every It girl in Los Angeles was publicly spiraling… Link to full article
Toronto Star, Jan 2021
TV sensation Lainey Lui’s dogs, Barney and Elvis, may the best-loved beagles in Toronto. You have to meet them
By Jillian Vieira

ELLE

There are dog people, and then there’s Lainey Lui. Along with husband Jacek Szenowicz, she’s pet parent to Barney, 10, and Elvis, 5, a pair of brotherly beagles who The Social co-host, eTalk co-anchor and founder of LaineyGossip.com fully admits are beneficiaries of an ultra-spoiled situation… Link to full article
ELLE Canada, May 2020
15 Inspirational Asian Canadians to Know
By Patricia Karounos and Hannah Zeigler

ELLE

All of our best gossip comes from Elaine Lui – or Lainey, as she is better known. The Toronto-born writer launched her eponymous blog, Lainey Gossip, in 2004 while still working at Vancouver’s Covenant House. Two years later, she quit her job to preside over the site full time, and she’s been a regular fixture in our pop-culture routine ever since… Link to full article
Chatelaine, Sept 2019
Elaine Lui On Aging: Some Women Want To Embrace Their Wrinkles, But That’s Not Me
By Courtney Shea

Chatelaine

I’m on TV several times a week for The Social and etalk, and one of the things I’m constantly hearing from audience members or on social media is, “Cut that hair!”—that it’s too long for my age. First of all: If you had my hair, would you cut it?… Link to full article
The Cut, Nov 2018
How I Get It Done: Elaine Lui of LaineyGossip
Lisa Ryan

The Cut

You’d be hard-pressed to find anyone who understands gossip better than Elaine “Lainey” Lui, the Canadian maven behind LaineyGossip.com. She’s been running the site for more than a decade, and parlayed it into a career as an entertainment journalist…. Link to full article
BBC News, Sept 2017
Canadian blogger Lainey Lui on why gossip is political
By Jessica Murphy

BBC

Elaine “Lainey” Lui is keeping a sharp eye on Colin Farrell. The Irish actor is a few tables over in the lobby of a downtown hotel being interviewed for a film he’s promoting at the Toronto International Film Festival (Tiff). The festival, which runs until 17 September, is a busy time for Lui…. Link to full article
The Ringer, October 2016
Lainey Is Yours in Gossip: How a 12-year-old celebrity blog became essential again
By Allison P. Davis

The Ringer

Elaine Lui has had her back to me for about 20 minutes, typing away on her Surface tablet. We’re tucked into her broom closet of an office in Toronto’s Bell Media complex, where Lui sits amid an immense but well-organized pile of stuff. A heap of designer shoes is stashed in a cubby; the walls are decorated in the style of collage-obsessed 19-year-old – there’s a Slytherin banner on her front door… Link to full article
Slate, July 2016
A Celebrity Gossip Expert Explains the Summer of Taylor Swift
By Heather Schwedel

Slate.com

Taylor Swift is having quite the summer – from her breakup with Calvin Harris to the birth of Hiddleswift to Kim Kardashian’s receipts-apalooza, plus or minus a Nils Sjoberg, she’s been consistently dominating headlines. But what does it all mean? LaineyGossip.com is where many of the smart women I follow online turn for informed interpretation of the latest celebrity scandal… Link to full article
The Walrus, March 2015
IN DEFENCE OF LOW CULTURE: And praise of love, hate, discovery, jealousy, obsession, betrayal, and mean-girling
By Elaine Lui for The Walrus Talks Creativity

walrus-speech-mar15.jpg

Elaine Lui is a Canadian television personality, reporter, blogger, and author. She runs the celebrity-gossip website laineygossip.com, reports for CTV’s etalk, co-hosts CTV’s daily talk series The Social, and wrote the mother-daughter memoir Listen to the Squawking Chicken… Link to see video
Toronto Life, November 2014
Toronto’s 50 Most Influential: the people who changed the city in 2014
By Toronto Life

toronto-life-nov14.jpg

She’s the quirkiest, funniest and most watchable member of The Social, CTV’s answer to The View, and the active ingredient in its success. The show, now in its second season, reaches 2.4 million viewers weekly (up 300,000 from Season One) and has reeled in such high-watt guests as Katy Perry, Jessica Alba, Jane Lynch and Daniel Radcliffe. Her website, LaineyGossip, attracts… Link to full article
FLARE May, 2014
Mother Clucker
By Maureen Halushak

flare-may2014.jpg

In her new “sort of” memoir, Lainey Gossip’s ELAINE LUI divulges her most personal scoop yet: the inner workings of her insanely close relationship with her mom, semi-affectionately known as the Squawking Chicken. Over dim sum, MAUREEN HALUSHAK observes the dynamic. Read on for the full experience, plus an exclusive excerpt… Link to full article

https://www.laineygossip.com/Luckiest-Girl-Alive-book-review/Books/2063

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TMI: My Life in Scandal by Perez Hilton

The phone call from Perez Hilton came two days earlier than planned.

“He can do it now instead,” his assistant emailed me on Wednesday.

I was totally unprepared. Hilton’s autobiography, “TMI: My Life in Scandal” (Chicago Review Press) — the one we’re supposed to talk about — sat unread on my desk.

Thinking “right now” might mean I had a few minutes to speed read, I reached for it. The phone rang.

Perez.

“I love your book,” I said, just to start it off. That’s all it took.

“Thank you,” Hilton responded. “I was so afraid that people wouldn’t like it. There’s so much of me in it, I’m one of the most transparent and honest people there are. People like that, and they like nostalgia and that’s me, I’m a dinosaur.”

Jurassic throwbacks seem a little bit overdone. Hilton hit the scene 20 years ago, garnering almost instant attention with his blend of gossipy take on celebrity distilled through his blog, podcasts, personal appearances and general lifestyle. He didn’t just report of celebrities, he hung with them. If he didn’t like them or had a juicy story, he reported it. His blog quickly was dubbed the “most hated blog in the world,” though he garnered millions of followers.

But the more he talks about being a dinosaur, it starts to make sense. He was one of the first bloggers.

“I started in 2004,” he said. “There are 13-year-old kids who don’t know about blogging, they’re doing TikTok. There were names that were big that no one thinks about anymore. You may luck your way into celebrity, but you have to have perseverance to be a success. You have to learn to reinvent yourself. I reinvented by going into podcasts; I have two YouTube channels. I started Instagram way back in 2011 when it first came out. It’s about knowing when the next trend is coming, and I’ve always been good at that. I’ve outlasted a lot of the stars I wrote about.”

But Hilton is still worried. Sure, he’s constantly metamorphosing, but he’s learned some lessons and he wants to share a few with me, starting with how important it is to live below your means.

“I have three children, I have to save for their education, I have to take care of them,” he said. Does he know about that new purse I bought? I wonder, vowing to return it.

He also worries about the Kardashians. I should note that by this point, I realized Hilton doesn’t have a filter, which is one of the many characteristics that make him so delightful.

“People reach a tipping point,” he said, explaining why he’s concerned about these glamorous, fully-endowed women who seem to have the most beautiful jewelry, homes, children, clothes, husbands, ex-husbands and boyfriends and a fascinating jet-set lifestyle.

I know about the jet-setting because last year, when I was on Providenciales, one of the islands in the Turks and Caicos, we’d made reservations to have dinner at the Conch House, a beach joint where fisherman dive for conch right off the shore and the cooks turn the meat info fritters, stew and all sorts of conch delights. But then the restaurant called and canceled our reservations. Why? Well, the Kardashians had just flown in and wanted to eat there, and they didn’t want non-cool people around. Their evening was filmed for their show. I didn’t watch it. We went the following Kardashian-less night.

But Hilton knows about tipping points. He reached his own a while back and it taught him lessons even if the Kardaashians aren’t listening to his advice right now.

“Now I’m the cheapest person I know,” he said.

Born Mario Armando Lavandeira, Jr. and raised in Florida, he graduated from New York University, dabbled in acting and public relations but found career success in his ability to feed our celebrity fascination.

“I’m sharing stories in my new book,” he said, “because I want to make money.”

All the juicy escapades with and about stars that I read when I finally read his book are delightful, but they come at a price.

“I work 17 hours a day,” Hilton said. “I never rest. But that’s part of perseverance. The more you work, the more you notice the patterns and you can see how they’re coming together, and which ones will become trends. That’s how you know what the next thing is going to be.”

For your information

What: Perez Hilton Virtual Event

When: 7 p.m. Nov. 30

Cost: This is a ticketed event, and a purchase is required to attend. Anderson’s offers a variety of ticket options. Every book ticket will include a signed copy of “TMI: My Life in Scandal.” 

FYI: To obtain tickets for the Perez Hilton virtual event, visit http://www.andersonsbookshop.com/event/perez-hilton. 

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