Tyra Banks Is Resurrecting Modelland

Tookie De La Crème, you will always be famous. Tyra Banks confirms she’s rereleasing her novel Modelland for its 15th anniversary, thanks to a resurgence on TikTok. The book’s been out of print for years, making it harder for fans to get hold of, especially as TikTokers were dissecting passages online. Banks saw the interest as a business opportunity and a way to thank those who’ve made it popular. “This book coming back is not just the same book coming back. I begged my publisher to let me add things,” Banks told EW. “It’s a resurrection, it’s coming back from the dead, but there are a few things added. Something in the front, and something toward the back that took me months to work on. I added things for the fans of this book to dive deeply into and to look forward to the future. It’s not just some future chapter, it’s something that I really concocted and added more lore and depth of story, and wanted people to finish that book and turn those pages and go, ‘No way!’ It’s participatory, what they’re doing.” Modelland comes out November 3 via Delacorte Press.

Earlier this year, the book’s ridiculous plot became a meme; the story follows a teen whose government name is Tookie De La Crème as she is forced into a boarding school for models called Modelland. She meets other quirky students as they try to survive the school’s rigorous curriculum to be a top model. It even had its own theme song. Sounds familiar? At the end of America’s Next Top Model, Banks wanted to find a new business avenue for herself and thought becoming an author would be her next hit. At the time of its release, the book wasn’t as successful as Banks had hoped, and it broke her heart. “When it didn’t hit, it was a deep, almost depression for me. My mom almost did an intervention and said, ‘You’ve got to take care of yourself,’” she shared. “So, I went to Bali to take care of myself during this not working.”

She’s not embarrassed by her bold choices, like the protagonist’s name; after all, she owns an ice-cream parlor that sells hot ice cream (hot SMiZE cream; check it out). “I named her Tookie de La Crème. I knew it was crazy back then, but I look at it now … and it’s insane. It’s friggin’ crazy,” she said. “I don’t know what it is, but it’s in my DNA. I don’t feel frustrated that things haven’t hit, but I am emotional that it’s hitting later.” Banks should go full synergy mode and name an ice cream after Tookie: Tookies and Crème.