When in Rome: A Novel

“I don’t think I’m supposed to be crying thinking of those things. I’m a two-time Grammy winner and I have a signed contract for ninety million dollars with the top record label in the business, so I shouldn’t be crying. I don’t deserve to be crying.”

This quote introduces the novel’s exploration of Amelia’s complicated relationship with fame. Though she feels sad and overwhelmed by the pressures of her life in the music business, she feels she doesn’t have a right to be sad due to her privilege. Amelia’s character arc sees her reframing her unhappiness in her career as a need for greater agency and autonomy rather than a lack of gratitude.

“I step back into my Rae Rose skin. It’s softer, gentler—more regal than mine. Rae Rose is everyone’s best friend. She’s pliable and easy to love.”

Amelia makes a clear distinction between her public persona, Rae Rose, and her true self, highlighting The Inherent Tension Between Celebrity and Authenticity. Amelia views Rae as a constructed image of the person the public wants her to be: “pliable and easy to love.”

“I throw on my sunglasses and baseball hat and hold my coffee like a shield. I’m going to need the added protection for my walk from the communal town parking lot to the shop. It’s only about a five-minute walk down Main Street, but that’s plenty of time to run into every single one of those damn townsfolk. Doesn’t matter that Rae Rose has only been in my house for nine hours. That’s eight more hours than necessary for Mabel to have called every person she knows and started the most incredible game of telephone anyone has ever seen. At least this means business will be booming today. Everyone is going to want a pie with a heavy side of gossip.”

As the novel opens, Noah’s anxiety about Rae Rose’s fame and his mixed feelings about his hometown’s propensity for involving themselves in his private life underscores the emotional baggage he carries from his previous breakup. Adams parallels both Amelia and Noah’s need to slip into a disguise to survive among others, a commonality that eventually helps them understand each other.