Asner—ex-model, wife of director Steven Soderbergh and E! Entertainment Television personality—debuts with a dishy mix of Tinseltown hackdom, chick lit and, surprisingly, a chilling plot. Dani Hale is an L.A. TV writer for crime show Flesh and Bone who has an inordinate interest in all things forensic—one shared by technical adviser Rich Pisani, a retired LAPD cop. “None of this stuff bothered me,” Dani boasts about crime scene analysis. But what does bother her is slow-to-commit boyfriend and director Dave; the pretty actress he’s directing, Chloe Johnson (whom Asner slyly credits as having worked with Soderbergh); her Crate and Barrel saleswoman mom; and work rival “Evil Janet.” But where other chick lit heroines fret about their fears, Dani hacks into e-mails and cellphones to alleviate hers. After discovering Dave has been cheating on her, Dani plots revenge on him, freckled harlot-starlet Chloe and office boor Evil Janet, but things quickly spiral out of control. Asner juggles horror and giggles and wraps it up with a subtle kicker, and though Rich’s role is underwritten, the novel is still tons of fun. (June)

Entertainment host Asner’s first novel is a send-up of the viciously cutthroat world of romance in Hollywood. Dani Hale is a staff writer for the successful forensics procedural Flesh and Blood, but while her professional success isn’t in question, she is finding her love life to be a trickier prospect. She is massively insecure in her relationship with her boyfriend of two years, a television director named Dave, and after conducting her own investigation, she soon discovers all her fears were founded when she learns he has been cheating on her with an up-and-coming starlet named Chloe. Dani dumps Dave and gingerly reenters the dating pool only to find that the prospects are grim. When Chloe turns up as a guest star on Dani’s show, Dani finds herself seeing red. This delightful black comedy shows how easy it is for someone to be driven to extremes—and how seamlessly a person can go from rifling through receipts to reading someone’s personal e-mail and beyond. Clever and witty, Asner’s debut will appeal to readers who like biting satire.

&mdashKristine Huntley

From Best Summer Books

June 2008

By Sarah Nelson, editor in chief of Publishers Weekly

WHAT DOES A WRITER READ? That’s the question people love to ask of a favorite novelist. Real Simple took it to the next level: What do authors of notable beach books turn to when they want to kick back? What, for instance, do writers as diverse as Augusten Burroughs and Danielle Steel pick to read in a day, a weekend, or a summer? What books do they keep on hand to dip into and out of? The recommendations here, in the authors’ own words, are as varied and surprising as the bold-faced names behind them. Which just goes to show: You can’t judge a writer’s taste by his covers.

Jackie Collins: Whacked, by Jules Asner (Weinstein Books, $24). “She’s a first-time author, married to director Steven Soderbergh, and this delicious tale of revenge—set in L.A.—rocks!”

GO AHEAD, FLIRT A LITTLE

In summer, we often go back to the same old places. Vacations are supposed to be easy, after all. - And it's easy to go back to the same writers for summer reading. Cracking open the latest book by your favorite author can be as satisfying as checking into your favorite hotel and knowing you're free of the workaday world for a while. -Mystery or romance, horror or chick lit, adventure or fantasy - whatever its genre, a good summer novel should engage you enough to take you someplace else, whether you're stretched out in a lounge chair beside the pool or crammed into an airline coach seat. -But there's something to be said for a summer romance of the literary kind - a thrilling little fling with someone altogether new. If it doesn't work out, no one has to know. Just leave the book behind in the hotel room, a one-novel stand. - So, instead of the usual suspects, here are half a dozen new and upcoming novels by first-time authors. Reading one just might be the beginning of a beautiful relationship.

Whacked - By Jules Asner

Asner has the bona fides for writing an insider novel about show biz: She has hosted a bunch of shows for E! Entertainment Television, and she's married to movie director Steven Soderbergh (Ocean's Eleven, Twelve,Thirteen and counting).

Whacked's Dani Hale is obsessed with famous Hollywood murders, which serves her well as a writer on a TV crime series. Her inquisitive nature also leads her to notice her perfect boyfriend might not be. His way of calling women who haven't had plastic surgery "factory" might be a clue.

Reminds us of: Sex and the City meets CSI and goes to Hollywood.

Weinstein Books, 264 pages, $23.95, June

&mdash Colette Bancroft, Times Book Editor

SUMMER BOOKS:
GUILTY PLEASURES

ESCAPE TO WORLDS OF DIAMONDS, SPIES AND VAMPIRES WITH THESE 10 BEACH BAG READS

5.Whacked

by Jules Asner

(Weinstein Books, June 3)

E! personality and wife of Steven Soderbergh sets her chuckle-inducing chick-lit tome in Tinseltown, where Dani Hale writes for TV crime series "Flesh and Bone." On discovering her director-boyfriend is cheating, she uses her investigative-reporter skills on him. Best of all, Asner gets a blurb from Guilty Pleasure Queen Jackie Collins.

&mdash Billy Heller

THE SUNDAY CONVERSATION

With Jules Asner

The former host for E! has written a book, 'Whacked.'
By Choire Sicha
Special to The Times

JULES ASNER wrote "Whacked," a new novel set in Hollywood about a lover spurned who plots creative revenge. She was the co-host of "E! News Daily" and host of "Revealed With Jules Asner." She is married to Steven Soderbergh.

You're on your third career -- model, T.V. anchor, author.

I was never really a model. That somehow is in my bio. The whole thing is I was tall since I was a child -- you're either a model or you play basketball.

When did you start writing?

I always thought when I grew up maybe I'd write a book and all of a sudden I'm 35. I started a few years ago -- it was based on a real-life breakup I had. And it made me crazy! So I started it four or five years ago and I stopped. I felt like writing about it put energy into it, and I was happily married. But I didn't want to be one of those people who hadn't finished a novel.

You got blurbed by Jackie Collins. That is basically like getting knighted by the Queen.

First of all, it's even more fantastic than that! I had a friend who was on a flight from JFK to L.A. Jackie Collins was reading the galley. They took an iPhone photo of it! It's one of the highlights of my life. Steven won the Palme d'Or -- well, Jackie Collins holding the book was really fantastic. I was like, can I get this made into a T-shirt? She's sold 400 million books!

I was going to ask if you'd ever been a crazy person like in the book -- and apparently you have.

I think women get labeled a lot as being crazy. But I think men make us crazy. All the technology now, it's easy to check up on people. Everyone's leaving this electronic trail behind them. Oh, I'll just check once! I'll pick up that phone. Like I said this was based on a bad relationship I was in years ago. It makes you feel terrible being that person. But I don't do that anymore.

I actually saw an ex across the street yesterday. It all came back. I wanted to kill him.

You've got loves of your life and breakups of your life, that kind of thing. They leave a mark. It stays with you, a bad aftertaste.

So is there a club yet? Do you just hang out all day with Ann Leary and Gigi Grazer?

No! Actually, Gigi was really nice. She gave me a quote for the book and I've never met her. I think she's very witty and talented. I think the closest is -- I work out of the [New York City writer's space] Paragraph on 14th street. That's the closest thing I have to a club -- going where no one talks to me. You're not allowed to talk on the phone. You can hear people typing and it makes you feel like, "I have to write too!" You can get your low-cal turkey Quiznos and come up and eat it in silence.

You did put in some serious time in the salt mines of celeb news. Did you ever get your hands dirty?

Um, no, it was all pretty Hollywoody fluffy. No, I'm glad I stopped doing it when I stopped doing it. If I still worked for some show like that, waiting around to do an interview with Paris Hilton or something like that, I'd throw myself out the window. I think the business has changed a lot. I remember I interviewed this very big star, a macho guy, somebody came and sprayed something on a toothbrush and then started combing his hair to cover his bald spot while he was talking to me. And I was like, we're not going to acknowledge this is happening? We're just going to talk about how nice the hotel is?

It has changed. Both the pace, and the interest in minutia.

It used to be someone would do an interview with Barbara Walters. Then it was Barbara and "Entertainment Tonight." Now there's so much celebrity stuff out there. I feel like I've heard every story about George Clooney possible. I know he has that pig! I know he played baseball in college! And I love him -- I like him a lot. Come on -- you must know way too much about Madonna.

Oh, I do. So your husband is some sort of indie film director? Are his movies any good?

His movies are great. He's very nice.

That's good. You don't want to be married to some schmuck.

He's very nice. And he read the book and I think he was only really scared once.

Hollywood book: Pulp friction

By George Rush and Joanna Rush Molloy

Jennifer Aniston and Ryan Seacrest should be happy with the way their pal, Jules Asner, portrays them in her fun new mystery novel, "Whacked," but other celebs may want to put a hit on the author.

Asner - former model, former E! Entertainment correspondent and still-reigning wife of director Steven Soderbergh - builds her modern noir tale around Dani Hale, a writer for the TV forensic show "Flesh and Bone." When Dani discovers that her slow-to-propose director boyfriend, Dave, has been making it with starlet Chloe Johnson, she vows payback.

Along the way, Drew Barrymore pops up at a party, trotting around "with no shoes, kissing everyone hello on the lips" and prompting two guys to whisper that, now that Barrymore has turned 30, "she's about to expire like spoiled milk."

Asner has fictional characters slice and dice other real-life stars - like the scene where two women analyze the authenticity of Angelina Jolie's breasts.

"God doesn't really make size-zero women with size-36C bustlines, right?" asks one. "Well, except for Angelina Jolie."

Says her friend: "Oh, darling, especially Angelina Jolie."

Asner also tempts us to guess the templates for other fictional characters. Miranda Robinson is the wife of an Oscar-winning director and "so anorexic and so tan she looked like a walking X-ray." (Shame on you for drawing any comparisons between Miranda and Kate Capshaw!) And the loathsome starlet du jour, Chloe, sports freckles - just like Lindsay Lohan.

"I didn't ask permission. Maybe I should have!" Asner told us. "I know Ryan [Seacrest] - I don't think he'd be bothered. And Jen [Aniston] is the sweetest, nicest person in the world. I'd only mention her in a great capacity."

While Asner has always been fascinated by Tinseltown tragedies like Marilyn Monroe, she wouldn't speculate on whether Lindsay and fellow train wreck Britney Spears will end up dead of self-inflicted party excess. But Asner does have ideas about why certain actresses stand the test of time.

"Nicole Kidman, Halle Berry, Catherine Zeta-Jones - you don't hear about them being all messed up at a club, because they're actually working," she says. "This young set, I guess they're actors, but I can't remember actually seeing their movies."

Her own hubby - who's mentioned in passing as having directed vile Chloe - encouraged her to write whatever she wanted.

"He's really great - he's the coolest guy I know," she says. "He loves the book."

Well, he better.

Off-kilter doesn't begin to describe Dani Hale, a cross between a capable Tina Fey character and Glenn Close's crazed character in Fatal Attraction . As a screenwriter for a forensic drama television series, Dani's star is rising, but being dumped by her boyfriend transforms her into a stalker whose fantasy world crosses into reality. Asner, a former model and entertainment reporter who is married to director Steven Soderbergh, is in her element here. If your taste in humor runs a bit skewed, you'll appreciate this one.

&mdash Teresa Jacobsen

BIG SUMMER LIST. 9 SIZZLING BEACH READS. We know you want a nice juicy tale

BY SHERRYL CONNELLY

Summer is no time to improve your mind. You want your brain on idle and your reading easy. But not dull. That's just a waste of sunblock. Here are nine novels guaranteed to get you hot even on a breezy day.

3. Funniest novel by a Hollywood wife. Jules Asner's history includes being an E! Entertainment Television personality and marrying director Steven Soderbergh. In Whacked (Weinstein Books, $23.95), her heroine, Dani Hale, writes for a crime show. But her real passion is her boyfriend Dave, a television director who, it turns out, is fooling around with an actress. What's a crime writer to do? Get inventive about revenge, obviously. Quite dishy, with cameo appearances by real-life celebs.