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Waiting for Britney Spears: A True Story, Allegedly
A gonzo account of Britney Spears’s meteoric rise and almost equally iconic fall, from Jeff Weiss, LA's Hunter S. Thompson.
America, 2003: A country at war, its shiny veneer beginning to crack. Von Dutch and The Simple Life dominate. And on the cover of every magazine, a twenty-two-year-old pop star named Britney Spears. Tracking her every move for a third-tier gossip rag in Los Angeles is a young writer named Jeff Weiss, who took whatever job he could to pursue his dream of being a “serious” writer. He'd instead become a firsthand witness to the slow tragedy of a changing nation, represented in spirit by “the coy it-girl at the end of history.”
Years later, after finally making it as a celebrated cultural critic, Weiss presents Waiting for Britney Spears, a gonzo, nostalgic, and mostly true recounting of Britney's rise and fall during his years in the tabloid underbelly of Los Angeles. Weiss follows America’s sweetheart through Vegas superclubs and Malibu car chases, annulled marriages and soul-crushing legal battles, all the way to Britney’s infamous 2005 VMA performance. As Weiss lives through the years leading to Britney’s conservatorship, he observes, with peerless style, cringe-inducing fashion waves, a destructive culture of celebrity surveillance, and a country whose decline is embodied by the devastating downturn of its former golden child.
With the narrative flair that established him as a singular chronicler of modern pop culture, Weiss goes for broke in Waiting for Britney Spears, a roaring Künstlerroman of celebrity, obsession, morality, and the last great pop star.
America, 2003: A country at war, its shiny veneer beginning to crack. Von Dutch and The Simple Life dominate. And on the cover of every magazine, a twenty-two-year-old pop star named Britney Spears. Tracking her every move for a third-tier gossip rag in Los Angeles is a young writer named Jeff Weiss, who took whatever job he could to pursue his dream of being a “serious” writer. He'd instead become a firsthand witness to the slow tragedy of a changing nation, represented in spirit by “the coy it-girl at the end of history.”
Years later, after finally making it as a celebrated cultural critic, Weiss presents Waiting for Britney Spears, a gonzo, nostalgic, and mostly true recounting of Britney's rise and fall during his years in the tabloid underbelly of Los Angeles. Weiss follows America’s sweetheart through Vegas superclubs and Malibu car chases, annulled marriages and soul-crushing legal battles, all the way to Britney’s infamous 2005 VMA performance. As Weiss lives through the years leading to Britney’s conservatorship, he observes, with peerless style, cringe-inducing fashion waves, a destructive culture of celebrity surveillance, and a country whose decline is embodied by the devastating downturn of its former golden child.
With the narrative flair that established him as a singular chronicler of modern pop culture, Weiss goes for broke in Waiting for Britney Spears, a roaring Künstlerroman of celebrity, obsession, morality, and the last great pop star.
402 pages, Kindle Edition
Published June 10, 2025
165 people are currently reading
8189 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 245 reviews
July 21, 2025
Unapologetic, but an apology would have been more appropriate.
June 10, 2025
This was well-written and interesting, but I can’t get past the hypocrisy of a tabloid writer who was voluntarily part of the problem, yet repeatedly separates himself from other paparazzi as if he’s better for passively standing and watching the dehumanizing chaos while doing nothing to stop it.
June 19, 2025
History is written by the victors, so I guess it makes sense that the guy who sells a book now about tabloid culture and Britney Spears 20 years after the events in question would be…A paparazzo. Sigh.
Weiss’ justifications for his role in toxic tabloid culture during the Aughts seems to be “I’m not as bad as the other paparazzi,” or “I’m not the only one who did it,” which is a bit like a Roman senator saying “I was only responsible for one of Julius Caesar’s stab wounds.”
He and his colleagues profited from the exploitation of Britney and many other young women who were famous during this era, and he seems to acknowledge that only as a wink-nudge “I’m a lesser evil” type of thing as he here seeks to profit from that same exploitation again.
Most of us were complicit in the tabloid culture of this era, and to an extent we all have to reckon with that. But since most of us seem to have actually learned something or at least felt a modicum of guilt about it, it’s all the more glaring when someone far more directly responsible for it does not.
If you want more information about Britney at this time, read HER book. Or one of the many thoughtful examinations of the good and bad of pop culture of this era written by critics and essayists looking back on a troubling phenomenon and trying to understand it rather than giving your money to one of the people who caused it. Kinda like buying “If I Did It” by OJ Simpson, you know?
*I received an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.*
Weiss’ justifications for his role in toxic tabloid culture during the Aughts seems to be “I’m not as bad as the other paparazzi,” or “I’m not the only one who did it,” which is a bit like a Roman senator saying “I was only responsible for one of Julius Caesar’s stab wounds.”
He and his colleagues profited from the exploitation of Britney and many other young women who were famous during this era, and he seems to acknowledge that only as a wink-nudge “I’m a lesser evil” type of thing as he here seeks to profit from that same exploitation again.
Most of us were complicit in the tabloid culture of this era, and to an extent we all have to reckon with that. But since most of us seem to have actually learned something or at least felt a modicum of guilt about it, it’s all the more glaring when someone far more directly responsible for it does not.
If you want more information about Britney at this time, read HER book. Or one of the many thoughtful examinations of the good and bad of pop culture of this era written by critics and essayists looking back on a troubling phenomenon and trying to understand it rather than giving your money to one of the people who caused it. Kinda like buying “If I Did It” by OJ Simpson, you know?
*I received an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.*
November 10, 2025
I should have known what to expect when this fella touted himself as “LA’s Hunter S. Thompson” (spoiler alert: he is not). But when your girl falls down a rabbit hole, she REALLY falls all the way down the rabbit hole. I have listened to Spears’ book, K-Fed’s book, watched Britney v Spears, re-watched Chaotic and have taken up near permanent residence on the new(ish) Britney subReddit so of course I grabbed this from the library in audiobook format as well.
The problem with this one is twofold. First, the information presented very much reads like Weiss was “in the room where it happened” where that certainly is not the case a good bit of the time. And secondly, Weiss paints the paparazzo (rightfully so) as a class of vultures, but somehow wants to ignore the fact that he was a bottomfeeder just like the rest of them.
If you are a completionist like me and can’t stop won’t stop once you find a topic that gets you interested, maybe (????) check this one out? From the library because it is worth pretty much zero dollars and doesn’t give any information that hasn’t been available on the intertubes time and time again.
The problem with this one is twofold. First, the information presented very much reads like Weiss was “in the room where it happened” where that certainly is not the case a good bit of the time. And secondly, Weiss paints the paparazzo (rightfully so) as a class of vultures, but somehow wants to ignore the fact that he was a bottomfeeder just like the rest of them.
If you are a completionist like me and can’t stop won’t stop once you find a topic that gets you interested, maybe (????) check this one out? From the library because it is worth pretty much zero dollars and doesn’t give any information that hasn’t been available on the intertubes time and time again.
November 17, 2025
The adage “depiction doesn’t equal endorsement” is spin cycled through every time a piece of challenging or explicit depiction of something horrific elbows its way into the forefront of the zeitgeist. Scroll through substack and I’m certain you could quickly find a dozen articles rehashing the same points about artistic integrity vs gratuitous trauma porn. Often these arguments defending “difficult” art emphasize that the author is separate and apart from their vile characters carrying out despicable deeds. But what happens when the line between fact and fiction is blurred? What do we do with our pitchforks or soapboxes then?
Waiting for Britney Spears is a perplexing, altogether fascinating illustration of this very conundrum. On the one hand, the book is a work of fiction, a coming of age in the early aughts featuring a bright eyed new college grad named Jeff Weiss who longs to be a writer, and stumbles his way into a job as a paparazzo feeding and chumming the shark infested waters that are the celebrity gossip beast. On the other, the author Jeff Weiss is a former paparazzo himself, peppering the narrative with details from his own time spent chasing a scoop irregardless of who it might hurt (a heated encounter with Bob Saget on a red carpet for example was based on a real life exchange during a time when the Olsen twins were a constant fixture in the tabloid headlines).
The end result is a deliciously written yet complicated time capsule of an era that surely every millennial or Gen X woman bears the scars of. The character Jeff Weiss is at constant war with himself and the stomach churning job he is paid (often quite handsomely) to do. He tries to rationalize and separate himself, framing himself as different because he understands the harm being caused, and yet… he appears again and again at pivotal moments in Britney Jean Spears’ very public mental health crisis. He recalls her “Coca-Cola eyes” and “beignet smile” when he first encounters her during the filming of her “Baby One More Time” music video, and traces the familiar beats of her meteoric rise and tragic fall we all know and now empathize with thanks to the clarity provided by nearly 20 years of hindsight.
Weiss’ novel does not shed any new light on the most tragic icon of an era fuelled by amphetamines, low rise jeans and Von Dutch, but it does provide a fascinating, if not slightly nauseating new angle to the heyday of tabloid “journalism” in America.
Waiting for Britney Spears is a perplexing, altogether fascinating illustration of this very conundrum. On the one hand, the book is a work of fiction, a coming of age in the early aughts featuring a bright eyed new college grad named Jeff Weiss who longs to be a writer, and stumbles his way into a job as a paparazzo feeding and chumming the shark infested waters that are the celebrity gossip beast. On the other, the author Jeff Weiss is a former paparazzo himself, peppering the narrative with details from his own time spent chasing a scoop irregardless of who it might hurt (a heated encounter with Bob Saget on a red carpet for example was based on a real life exchange during a time when the Olsen twins were a constant fixture in the tabloid headlines).
The end result is a deliciously written yet complicated time capsule of an era that surely every millennial or Gen X woman bears the scars of. The character Jeff Weiss is at constant war with himself and the stomach churning job he is paid (often quite handsomely) to do. He tries to rationalize and separate himself, framing himself as different because he understands the harm being caused, and yet… he appears again and again at pivotal moments in Britney Jean Spears’ very public mental health crisis. He recalls her “Coca-Cola eyes” and “beignet smile” when he first encounters her during the filming of her “Baby One More Time” music video, and traces the familiar beats of her meteoric rise and tragic fall we all know and now empathize with thanks to the clarity provided by nearly 20 years of hindsight.
Weiss’ novel does not shed any new light on the most tragic icon of an era fuelled by amphetamines, low rise jeans and Von Dutch, but it does provide a fascinating, if not slightly nauseating new angle to the heyday of tabloid “journalism” in America.
July 30, 2025
You think I've sold out?
Dead right I've sold out
I just keep waiting for the right offer
Comfortable quarters, regular rations
24-hour Five Star room service
And if I'm honest, I like the lady
I can't help being touched by her folly
I'm treading water, taking the money
Watching her sun set
Well, I'm a writer
(from the musical Sunset Boulevard - though it seems very apt for the author of this book)
Jeff Weiss is an American journalist and former paparazzo. His 2025 memoir/pseudo-biography Waiting for Britney Spears recounts his multiple brushes with the popstar, from appearing as an uncredited extra in her debut video, Baby One More Time (purely by coincidence, as it was shot at his Los Angeles high school), to spending his early 20s doing freelance work for several journalistic outlets of sensationalist repute where much of his work revolved around following Spears around to capitalize on real or imagined scandals. Though Weiss also spent time
Like many others here, I had very mixed feelings about this book and what Weiss' motivations are for publishing it now in 2025. Weiss claims multiple times in the book that he felt bad for Spears (even telling her that to her face once), never wished Spears ill, felt uncomfortable profiting from the industry, the fact is he was active participant in it then and apparently wants to continue profiting from it now. Weiss is morally very dark gray, though not quite as morally black as the likes of fellow memoirists like Phil Elwood (see his book All the Worst Humans: How I Made News for Dictators, Tycoons, and Politicians, where he attempts to defend his job doing public relations cover-ups for truly vile people).
As previously alluded to, I listened to the audiobook, which is narrated in dramatic fashion by Weiss, Bouzad, and a female performer, further underscoring that this book is intended for entertainment and gossip, not as a retrospective mea culpa.
My biggest takeaway from the book was that I felt even worse for Spears than I had before, hearing details of how she was stalked, provoked, and surrounded by people who weren't looking out for her best interests for years.
Further reading:
The Woman in Me by Britney Spears | my review
Toxic: Women, Fame, and the Tabloid 2000s by Sarah Ditum | my review
My statistics:
Book 235 for 2025
Book 2161 cumulatively
June 13, 2025
This was just an okay memoir. I’m a diehard Britney fan and had some reservations about reading a memoir from a paparazzo. But from his retelling, he wasn’t one of the bad ones harassing her. Of course, it wouldn’t benefit him to say he was, but he does defend her constantly in this book. He witnessed a lot of her pivotal moments and even maneuvered himself onto the set of “…Baby One More Time” as an extra, where he immediately fell in love with her.
Much of this memoir is him kind of circling her—ending up where she is, but never getting close. He was clearly infatuated with her for years, and in a way, he sounds like he genuinely tried to protect and help her.
Still, it’s hard to know what’s true. He profited off her, especially since his partner and friend was apparently close enough to Britney that she let him take photos—as long as he made it quick and left her alone afterward. He seemed to have some respect and ethics for a paparazzo, but I don’t know—I’m conflicted. He still made bank off her early trauma with his photos.
There were things in this memoir I’d never heard before, and it was interesting to see such viral moments through the eyes of a bystander. But it was also strange how he was always just… there.
He was there watching her from the bar at a club. He was there when other paparazzi harassed her (like during the infamous baby on her lap while driving scandal). He was just outside her dressing room during the Gimme More VMA blunder. He was outside the barbershop when she shaved her head. He was kind of always there—watching—and it creeped me out.
I appreciate that he defended her and wrote a thoughtful memoir that mostly argues in her favor, but the whole thing still felt creepy and weird at times. Also, a lot of the details and side stories were incredibly drawn-out and boring. He keeps talking about how much he didn’t want to do the job, but he always went back to it. Bro, just own it—the money was good. Dwelling on how reluctant he was got old fast. What’s done is done. The hypocrisy was frustrating.
I listened to this on audio and tried Googling some of the people and stories he mentioned. Unless I’m misspelling things (which shouldn’t make that much of a difference), I couldn’t substantiate a lot of what he claimed. The audio production itself was interesting, with multiple narrators (I loved the woman who voiced Britney), but the one who did Oliver’s voice? I could barely understand him. The accent was way overdone.
All in all, if you’re a big Britney fan and curious about what was going through the mind of a paparazzo during the height of her fame, this might be worth a read (but not a listen—skip the audiobook unless you’re following along with the text). It didn’t feel predatory to me or like it was trying to further profit off Britney’s pain, but the author still gave me the creeps—so take that for what it’s worth.
Thank you, Macmillan Audio, for this ALC in exchange for my honest opinion.
Much of this memoir is him kind of circling her—ending up where she is, but never getting close. He was clearly infatuated with her for years, and in a way, he sounds like he genuinely tried to protect and help her.
Still, it’s hard to know what’s true. He profited off her, especially since his partner and friend was apparently close enough to Britney that she let him take photos—as long as he made it quick and left her alone afterward. He seemed to have some respect and ethics for a paparazzo, but I don’t know—I’m conflicted. He still made bank off her early trauma with his photos.
There were things in this memoir I’d never heard before, and it was interesting to see such viral moments through the eyes of a bystander. But it was also strange how he was always just… there.
He was there watching her from the bar at a club. He was there when other paparazzi harassed her (like during the infamous baby on her lap while driving scandal). He was just outside her dressing room during the Gimme More VMA blunder. He was outside the barbershop when she shaved her head. He was kind of always there—watching—and it creeped me out.
I appreciate that he defended her and wrote a thoughtful memoir that mostly argues in her favor, but the whole thing still felt creepy and weird at times. Also, a lot of the details and side stories were incredibly drawn-out and boring. He keeps talking about how much he didn’t want to do the job, but he always went back to it. Bro, just own it—the money was good. Dwelling on how reluctant he was got old fast. What’s done is done. The hypocrisy was frustrating.
I listened to this on audio and tried Googling some of the people and stories he mentioned. Unless I’m misspelling things (which shouldn’t make that much of a difference), I couldn’t substantiate a lot of what he claimed. The audio production itself was interesting, with multiple narrators (I loved the woman who voiced Britney), but the one who did Oliver’s voice? I could barely understand him. The accent was way overdone.
All in all, if you’re a big Britney fan and curious about what was going through the mind of a paparazzo during the height of her fame, this might be worth a read (but not a listen—skip the audiobook unless you’re following along with the text). It didn’t feel predatory to me or like it was trying to further profit off Britney’s pain, but the author still gave me the creeps—so take that for what it’s worth.
Thank you, Macmillan Audio, for this ALC in exchange for my honest opinion.
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March 3, 2025started & finished this while traveling today and. Oh baby this is so fun. a book sized essay on tabloid culture from the center of its slimy little heart. kind of like EVERYTHING I NEED I GET FROM YOU but swap 1D for Britney Spears lore. loved
July 9, 2025
While this was a well-written and, at times, wildly entertaining memoir, it still feels “icky” to me. I even feel partially guilty for engaging with this book, because at the end of the day, it is sort of another exploitation of Britney’s pain.
Born in 1992, I remember getting Britney Spears’s debut album in elementary school. I loved her- I wanted to be her. I asked my parents to do my hair like Britney’s. My friends and I created dances to our favorite songs and performed them in after school clubs. I argued with friends over which pop star was the best. As a kid, the pop world of the 90s and early 2000s was dazzling.
But I also remember my seeing tabloid headlines at the supermarket. My mom bringing home Us Weekly with unflattering pictures of Britney on the cover alongside sensationalist headlines. I remember the widespread body shaming of her after her messy VMAs performance. I remember comments from my mom - “she’s going to end up dead if she’s not careful”.
As a 33 year old woman in 2025 reading “Waiting for Britney”, my heart ached and my stomach turned. I recalled all of the events in this saga- seeing them in magazines, online, discussing it with friends. Revisiting my thoughts and feelings through a new lens was eye-opening.
Jeff Weiss is a skilled writer and storyteller, but I can’t help but roll my eyes listening to him continue to choose to be a member of the paparazzi machine, while also self-righteously setting himself apart morally.
In the end, I mostly want to know a few things: How does Britney feel about this memoir? How much of this is true? I’ll be following this directly with Britney’s memoir.
Born in 1992, I remember getting Britney Spears’s debut album in elementary school. I loved her- I wanted to be her. I asked my parents to do my hair like Britney’s. My friends and I created dances to our favorite songs and performed them in after school clubs. I argued with friends over which pop star was the best. As a kid, the pop world of the 90s and early 2000s was dazzling.
But I also remember my seeing tabloid headlines at the supermarket. My mom bringing home Us Weekly with unflattering pictures of Britney on the cover alongside sensationalist headlines. I remember the widespread body shaming of her after her messy VMAs performance. I remember comments from my mom - “she’s going to end up dead if she’s not careful”.
As a 33 year old woman in 2025 reading “Waiting for Britney”, my heart ached and my stomach turned. I recalled all of the events in this saga- seeing them in magazines, online, discussing it with friends. Revisiting my thoughts and feelings through a new lens was eye-opening.
Jeff Weiss is a skilled writer and storyteller, but I can’t help but roll my eyes listening to him continue to choose to be a member of the paparazzi machine, while also self-righteously setting himself apart morally.
In the end, I mostly want to know a few things: How does Britney feel about this memoir? How much of this is true? I’ll be following this directly with Britney’s memoir.
February 23, 2025
Waiting for Britney Spears, a True Story, Allegedly, is a ridiculously well-written account of the rise and fall of Britney Spears as experienced through the eyes of Jeff Weiss, a former tabloid writer. He begins his tale recounting his experience as a crowd extra in one of Spears’ first music videos and closes his book with the establishment of her family’s controversial conservatorship over the troubled star. Weiss’ affection for Spears is evident and rings true—while he acknowledges that he was also part of the exploitation machine that added to her struggles in the mid-2000s (and grapples with his guilt about it as well…). It was compelling to read about how the tabloid industry operates (both ethically and otherwise) and Weiss is a gifted writer. Many thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for an ARC in return for my unbiased review.
June 16, 2025
DEVOURED this book. The writing is stellar and I was enthralled by every scene. I loved all the cameos by celebrities and retellings of memorable moments like Britney’s VMA performance. Everyone I know also loves it. The audiobook is SOO great, I heard the actual paparazzi photographer who inspired the character Oliver reads his own lines. He shot the photos on the book cover too. This book is PERFECT for laying around in the sunshine. It’s the book of the summer. There’s humor, the narrator has an interesting moral lens, it’s subtle and raw and it’s honestly the best thing I’ve read in a long time. I wish there was more. LOVE THIS!!!
July 29, 2025
rooty tooty fresh n fruity mentioned
July 20, 2025
DNF.
I made it to chapter 5 and honestly could not continue on. The writer set themselves a bold task: depict the problems (and dangers) of tabloid culture in relation to one of the greatest pop stars of our time, whilst presenting themselves as a character who is somehow different to other paparazzi. Because they … have feelings?! In any case, it didn’t land.
The book read like the very definition of performative allyship: a man insisting he’s critiquing misogyny while embodying it. The snarky, bro-ish tone and shallow self-awareness left me wondering if the point was to challenge the system — or just profit from it, again.
I made it to chapter 5 and honestly could not continue on. The writer set themselves a bold task: depict the problems (and dangers) of tabloid culture in relation to one of the greatest pop stars of our time, whilst presenting themselves as a character who is somehow different to other paparazzi. Because they … have feelings?! In any case, it didn’t land.
The book read like the very definition of performative allyship: a man insisting he’s critiquing misogyny while embodying it. The snarky, bro-ish tone and shallow self-awareness left me wondering if the point was to challenge the system — or just profit from it, again.
July 13, 2025
Not sure why this book needs to exist? It’s one part woe-is-me, one part self righteousness, and one part fantasizing being with Britney Spears. He’s somehow villainizing and victimizing Britney at the same time (and also himself). He refers to all other paparazzi/reporters as stalkers but doesn’t realize that he is a stalker too (because he’s not like other guys - what he’s doing is somehow different from what everyone else is doing). He profited off Britney 20 years ago and he’s still trying to do it now.
August 14, 2025
This sucked. Based on the back cover, I thought this would be a critical analysis of surveillance culture in the early 2000s and how the Britney paparazzi obsession was a manifestation of that. Why that was even mentioned I don’t know because the only inclusion of the political landscape was a throw away sentence every 75 pages.
Forced empathy, false shame, and gratuitous overwriting. He kept trying to place blame on others for making him continue in this scummy work but even after he finally left he’s clearly obsessed with doing it because this book reads like a gossip rag.
I’m not even a Britney fan like that but this pissed me off. Will be reading her memoir at some point to counteract
Forced empathy, false shame, and gratuitous overwriting. He kept trying to place blame on others for making him continue in this scummy work but even after he finally left he’s clearly obsessed with doing it because this book reads like a gossip rag.
I’m not even a Britney fan like that but this pissed me off. Will be reading her memoir at some point to counteract
September 11, 2025
Çok eğlendim ama yani anca beni eğlendirir
July 21, 2025
I hate this book.
March 1, 2025
Having read Britney Spears’ autobiography, I thought it might be interesting to read the paparazzi side of her story. Waiting for Britney Spears details the author’s journey into the dark side of celebrity reporting. Drugs, alcohol, and high speed chases abound in this story. You will hear details of upscale restaurants and mansions of the rich and famous. It also paints the reality of someone that is famous and can’t get 2 minutes to herself. Someone that is a person like the rest of us but can’t get a break, until she literally breaks. Follow along on the wild ride of Britney Spears.
While I found this book detailed and interesting, I also found it to be very overwritten, loaded with adjectives that seemed unnecessary, bogging down the plotline. Clearer sentence structure would be a better way to convey the story.
Thanks NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book.
While I found this book detailed and interesting, I also found it to be very overwritten, loaded with adjectives that seemed unnecessary, bogging down the plotline. Clearer sentence structure would be a better way to convey the story.
Thanks NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book.
August 12, 2025
I felt like Max hooked to the front of the car in Fury Road except we were driving around a different heartless hellscape, Los Angeles.
July 24, 2025
If you remember the day the “Baby One More Time” MV dropped on much music/MTV, clutching your Bop/BB/tiger beat issues, blasting Britney on your Discman - this one’s for you.
Waiting for Britney Spears by Jeff Weiss is part memoir, part autofiction, and all nostalgia. Weiss was literally in the baby one more time music video, then later became a tabloid reporter covering Britney during her most popular years.
It’s wild, weird, self-aware, and so much fun, especially for those of us who remember the golden age of TRL, candied lip gloss, and feeling like we didn’t have a care in the world.
I loved every sentence of this messy love letter to an icon and a brutal media era we’re still unpacking. It’s the perfect summer read for anyone who grew up right alongside her.
Waiting for Britney Spears by Jeff Weiss is part memoir, part autofiction, and all nostalgia. Weiss was literally in the baby one more time music video, then later became a tabloid reporter covering Britney during her most popular years.
It’s wild, weird, self-aware, and so much fun, especially for those of us who remember the golden age of TRL, candied lip gloss, and feeling like we didn’t have a care in the world.
I loved every sentence of this messy love letter to an icon and a brutal media era we’re still unpacking. It’s the perfect summer read for anyone who grew up right alongside her.
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August 18, 2025Oh man I don’t think I can rate this book but I have a lot of thoughts. Can’t get past the icky-ness of this book coming from a tabloid writer but then who else would have these details? We’re all complicit but seems like some (author) might be more so than others.
Side note: I feel like the description of this book is super misleading, I wouldn’t go into it thinking it’s a deep culture criticism tying America in the early 00s to tabloid culture.
Side note: I feel like the description of this book is super misleading, I wouldn’t go into it thinking it’s a deep culture criticism tying America in the early 00s to tabloid culture.
July 18, 2025
Three and a half stars isn’t necessarily a fair reflection for how I felt about this book. It was well written and certainly engaging, always teetering as you’re never quite sure what is real and what is not. Do we need this story, this voice about Britney Spears’ life? Isn’t this just another go around in the swirl the author says he denounced decades ago. It’s conflicting, and yet hard to look away from, much like the years of Britney’s life this chronicles.
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July 11, 2025I have mixed feelings but ultimately I had a good time reading this. the fact that I don’t really like the guy but like the book…. mama I’m in love with a criminal….
August 23, 2025
2 stars because Jeff Weiss has to remind us for 30% of the book that he’s morally better than the other 2000s paps while still engaging in their exact behavior lol
November 24, 2025
as someone who was too young to remember the big britney days, this was a really interesting read. the topic is heavy, but the pov is fascinating and the writing style is glitzy and playful. four stars from me because i felt really immersed while reading it!
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June 12, 2025What a ride. Full review for Kompressor/Deutschlandfunk Kultur.
August 14, 2025
Insufferable and self-indulgent. Written in a style that only men who grew up reading Chuck Klosterman could achieve. Moral qualms or not, Jeff was still, allegedly, a creep.
July 12, 2025
Interesting inside look at the destruction wreaked by our continual cultural obsession w celebrities. I wasn’t hooked the whole time, hence the 3/5 rating
July 15, 2025
DNF after two chapters. It gave me the BIGGEST ick. I don't think I'll ever try to read more of it.
June 11, 2025
I found an advanced reading copy of this book on the street in my Brooklyn neighborhood and I am so glad I did. I have a Substack where I recently started writing about books I find (& read) in the neighborhood and I’m so grateful that *this* was the book to kick it off.
*#* For fans of: Mike Crumplar’s “Crumpstack” Substack, Cat Marnell’s “How To Murder Your Life”, Considering Yourself Very Literate and Still Actively Loving “The Hills”, Reading Gossip Girl in the Year 2005, Feeling Like a Somebody.
This book is f*cking fun and f*cking good. It’s Holden Caulfield with a vodka Red Bull. It’s Perez Hilton with a PhD in Linguistics. It’s the feeling of swinging a ratty sequin mesh bag in WeHo while listening to Shwayze on your iPod. If you’re nosy, if you’re wordy, if pop culture analysis from a voyeuristic viewpoint tickles you… pick this book up. One of my faves so far this year. I’m shocked, too. An easy five stars.
*#* For fans of: Mike Crumplar’s “Crumpstack” Substack, Cat Marnell’s “How To Murder Your Life”, Considering Yourself Very Literate and Still Actively Loving “The Hills”, Reading Gossip Girl in the Year 2005, Feeling Like a Somebody.
This book is f*cking fun and f*cking good. It’s Holden Caulfield with a vodka Red Bull. It’s Perez Hilton with a PhD in Linguistics. It’s the feeling of swinging a ratty sequin mesh bag in WeHo while listening to Shwayze on your iPod. If you’re nosy, if you’re wordy, if pop culture analysis from a voyeuristic viewpoint tickles you… pick this book up. One of my faves so far this year. I’m shocked, too. An easy five stars.
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