MINNEAPOLIS – “Thank you, Aaron Spelling, for dying!” said Sara Chapman of Excelsior. Don’t take that the wrong way. She has nothing against Spelling, but “Tori did very well.”

Chapman had Tori Spelling in her Us Weekly fantasy league and Aaron Spelling’s June 23 death landed daughter Tori on the magazine’s cover twice – a coup worth 17 points, enough to raise Chapman two places in the rankings (from eighth to sixth). That’s no small feat, considering whom commissioner Michelle Hanson snagged for her No. 1 draft pick.

“She’s always lucky. She has Britney,” said an envious Kathryn (Kacky) Britt.

Star Jones. Katie Holmes. Pam Anderson. Britney Spears. Sean Federline (Spears’ baby). For Chapman, Hanson, Britt and a half-dozen other friends – all professionals in their 30s and mostly Minnesota transplants – betting on the newsworthiness of their celebrity players has become an obsession, an escape, an excuse to get together – and a way to score some extra shoe money.

Some of the women started meeting three years ago as a book club. But this spring, Chapman shared an article from ESPN Magazine by Bill Simmons called “A Fantasy League for Females,” in which Simmons put forth the idea of an Us Weekly league so that his wife would understand his passion for sports fantasy leagues. This piqued the interest of the book club members, many of whom have participated in football and basketball fantasy leagues.

So when they met last month on the rooftop patio of event manager Alice Sydow’s condo in downtown Minneapolis over red wine and pizza, they discussed not only Sue Monk’s “The Mermaid Chair” but the week’s celebrity news. Now book discussion takes up only about 20 percent of their two-hour-long get-togethers.

The celebrity weeklies have turned gossip into a spectator sport, said Us Weekly’s editor in chief, Janice Min.

“Being involved with celebrity is akin to male sports watching,” Min said. “It’s the same kind of fan devotion. Hollywood is so competitive that it only makes sense for fans to keep track this way. Why not bring some of the competition to the people who support the celebrities?”

To kick off their fantasy celeb season, the Minneapolis gossip girls held a draft to each choose seven men and seven women. They play five players of both sexes per week. The league runs on a photo-driven point system, where the main cover photo is worth 10 points, and the rest are worth fewer. An ill-dressed celeb who shows up in “Fashion Police” translates into a three-point loss for the unlucky person who drafted that star.

At the end of the three-month season, which is the beginning of October for this group, the players with the top three scores will divvy up the $25 entry fees.

Hanson tallies the scores each week on an Excel spreadsheet. Each Thursday, she scours the city for the new Us Weekly (her subscription copy doesn’t come fast enough) and tabulates the results.

Hanson is becoming known for her guerrilla tactics: The day of the league’s meeting she went to Target for the new issue. It wasn’t there. An employee directed her to the distributor, whom she called.

“I was on the phone for 15 minutes and (the receptionist) couldn’t understand why I was so desperate,” Hanson said. That call sent Hanson and Britt to a Shinders store in Minneapolis, where they bought one of the earliest copies to reach the Twin Cities.

While most group members claim not to have been celebrity-obsessed before joining the league, it’s easy to get caught up in the competitive spirit (aided by wine and good company, of course). “It makes my life now,” Britt said.

At their meeting on the patio, Sydow studied the spreadsheet while the others attempted to focus on book talk. Sydow apologized for not finishing the novel.

“I started a new job four weeks ago. Where’s the money, honeys? It’s here!” Sydow said, referring to the league. She then added Taylor Hicks, Penelope Cruz and Heather Mills to her roster.

At one point, Molly McMillen piped up, “Is anyone bothered by her cheating on her husband?” She meant the protagonist in “The Mermaid Chair,” not a celeb. Britt, a fifth-grade teacher, also pushed the group to discuss the book. “Why is the mermaid central?” she tried.

No one was biting. Even McMillen lost her focus, lamenting to anyone who’d listen:

“I want Jim Carrey back!”