Close Relationships with Strangers - by Krista Diamond (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

Close Relationships with Strangers follows a Las Vegas wildlife photographer who moves to Los Angeles to become a paparazzo and in the process loses his relationships, his morals, and eventually his tether to reality.

Reviled by celebrities and the public, Ben is one of the last remaining paparazzi scouring the streets of Los Angeles. Amateurs with camera phones, social media, and a lack of bonafide stars have slowly killed a once essential role in the Hollywood apparatus. Jack Whitlock is one of the last remaining A-listers, and Ben has followed his career since the years he spent bussing tables at a diner in Las Vegas where his most popular movie once filmed a scene.

When Jack Whitlock is suddenly embroiled in a sex scandal, Ben begins his pursuit, eager for both a big paycheck and a chance to be close to the elusive star. Along the way, he is haunted by mistakes from his past: the photos he took of a pop star that have led to death threats, the ghost of his failed relationship with a burlesque dancer named Ellory, and his abandoned dream of being a wildlife photographer.

Searing and propulsive, Close Relationships with Strangers is a behind the lens tour-de-force through the streets of Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and the desert in between, as readers follow Ben, unrelenting, obsessive, and wry, on a quest that will lead either to his redemption or demise.

Review Quotes

"A chilly, accomplished debut that unflinchingly dissects our obsession with celebrity."
--Kirkus Reviews

"A perfect novel for celebrity-culture lovers and skeptics alike."
--Booklist

"Diamond convincingly brings to life the amoral Ben and his eroded sense of self... It's a distinctive character portrait."
--Publishers Weekly

"I loved Krista Diamond's Close Relationships with Strangers, an atmospheric LA noir about obsession and the predatory machinery of celebrity (my shit). Desperate and morally adrift, Ben is a compelling antihero--a loner paparazzo hunting the one photograph that could save him."
--Anna Dorn, author of Perfume & Pain

"Close Relationships with Strangers is a taut, mesmerizing portrait of a photographer undone by the images he pursues. An elegant exploration of desire and delusion, Krista Diamond's debut is as haunting as it is humane."
--Antonia Angress, author of Sirens & Muses

"Krista Diamond beautifully depicts Ben, a paparazzo at the end of the golden age of tabloid photography, as he is drawn into the liminal zone between illusion and delusion. She's captured the uncanny solitude of Las Vegas and Los Angeles, both cities in the American west that loom as simulacra in popular imagination, with an undercurrent of nostalgia for the recent past in this story of a loner obsessively pursuing his already anachronistic calling; it's reminiscent of the noir stories of Raymond Chandler and Nathaniel West, and the mood it evokes has stayed with me a very long time."
--Maile Chapman, author of Your Presence is Requested at Suvanto

About the Author

Krista Diamond's writing has appeared or is forthcoming in The New York Times, The Paris Review, Cosmopolitan, and elsewhere. She holds an MFA from the University of Nevada Las Vegas and her work has been supported by Bread Loaf, Tin House, and the Nevada Arts Council. She lives in Las Vegas. Close Relationships with Strangers is her debut novel.