Jen Trynin's engaging new memoir, Everything I'm Cracked Up To Be, resembles 2005's So You Wanna Be A Rock & Roll Star, by Semisonic drummer Jacob Slichter; both books offer an outsider take on the surreal machinery of the music business, as seen from the wry, skeptical perspective of someone who was nearly ground up in its gears. But where the enormous success of "Closing Time" earned Slichter's trio the dreaded "one-hit wonder" designation, Trynin wasn't lucky enough to score even a single hit, though her infectious single "Better Than Nothing" had all the makings of a "You Oughta Know"-like breakout smash. In that respect, she's less a has-been than an almost-was, and she ekes well-deserved pathos out of her gradual realization that, major-label contract or not, she isn't destined for anything approaching stardom.
Less the promised "rock & roll fairy tale" than a cautionary tale about the havoc even a marginal level of fame can wreak on an otherwise-grounded individual, the book opens with Trynin desperate to break out of the musical ghetto for acoustic-guitar-slinging women. After a successful, self-engineered image makeover, Trynin eventually signs to Warner Bros., but she's unceremoniously dropped after her singles repeatedly tank. In the interim, she nearly loses her sense of self and sanity amid the demands of touring, promotion, songwriting, recording, and an ill-advised fling with a bandmate that has devastating consequences, both personally and professionally.
Cracked gets off to a rocky start, with Trynin occasionally overdosing on trite rock 'n' roll clichés—most egregiously, the overuse of the word "chick," slang that reeks of 47-year-old A&R reps with graying ponytails, even when used by a woman. But Trynin grows tremendously as a writer over the course of the book, and her memoir develops a cumulative power as it becomes increasingly apparent that her days as a major-label recording artist are numbered. Professionally speaking, Trynin's label chewed her up and spit her out, but she enacts stealthy, delayed revenge with this ingratiating, winningly candid book, emerging from her flirtation with pop stardom older, wiser, and blessed with one hell of a story.