The Satirical Novel “Lucky Dogs” Inspired by Weinstein’s Scandal

LUCKY DOGS, by Helen Schulman

Helen Schulman’s seventh novel, “Lucky Dogs,” is a satirical work inspired by the Harvey Weinstein scandal. In the book, Schulman refers to two people who played a role in the Weinstein saga: actress Rose McGowan and Stella Penn Pechanac, the Black Cube agent assigned to gather intelligence on McGowan. Schulman refashions McGowan as Meredith “Merry” Montgomery: a starlet who is working on a tell-all about her bad experience with a toupeed movie executive nicknamed the Rug. Schulman’s answer to the question of how one woman could do this to another is funny, deeply knowing, and indignant.

The novel delves into the issue of technology’s seepage into the human soul and considers what it means to be a public figure in an age where everyone has a profile. Fame is an inevitably fleeting and vulnerable condition in “Lucky Dogs,” and the storyline considers the power of anonymity and untraceability in contrast to celebrity.

Schulman’s novel gradually builds to a realization of the essential commonality of the two female characters. Smadar Marantz is a Bosnian refugee trained by Mossad to work as Dark Star, which is similar to Black Cube, and the contrast between her circumstances and those of Montgomery make up the suspenseful body of the book.

“Lucky Dogs” is a daringly creative and often gleeful coda to this long, sad, sordid true story.

LUCKY DOGS | By Helen Schulman | 321 pp. | Alfred A. Knopf | $28