Bring the House Down

ONE OF GLAMOUR'S BEST BOOKS FOR BOOK CLUBS - A theater critic at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe writes a vicious one-star review of a struggling actress he has a one-night stand with in this sharply funny, feminist tinderbox.

"Excellent...brilliant...a fiery reminder that we still have so far to go when it comes to men behaving poorly and getting away with it."--LitHub

"A binge-worthy novel that explores our obsessions, our inner critic, and who we think we are in person and in print. Intimate, real, and really funny. This one has teeth." --Kiley Reid, New York Times bestselling author of Come and Get It and Such a Fun Age

Alex Lyons always has his mind made up by the time the curtain comes down at a performance--the show either deserves a five-star rave or a one-star pan. Anything in between is meaningless. On the opening night of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, he doesn't deliberate over the rating 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 theater critic who's just written a career-ending review of her, Hayley wakes up at his apartment to see his scathing one-star critique in print on the kitchen table, and she's not sure which humiliation offends her the most. So she revamps her 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.

A brilliant Trojan horse of a book about art, power, misogyny, and female rage, Bring the House Down is a searing, insightful, and often hilarious debut that captures the blurred line between reality and performance.

Author: Charlotte Runcie
Publisher: Doubleday Books
Published: 07/08/2025
Pages: 304
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.00lbs
Size: 8.62h x 5.85w x 0.93d
ISBN: 9780385551076


Review Citation(s):
Kirkus Reviews 05/01/2025
Publishers Weekly 05/05/2025
Booklist 06/01/2025 pg. 21
Shelf Awareness 07/27/2025
Library Journal 08/02/2025 pg. 1

About the Author
CHARLOTTE RUNCIE was most recently The Daily Telegraph's radio critic and senior arts columnist. She has also written for magazines and newspapers including The Times and The Guardian, spending years in the culture trenches reviewing shows at the Edinburgh Festival. A graduate of Cambridge University, Charlotte was longlisted for the 2023 Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize and the Bridport Prize, and was a Foyle Young Poet of the Year.