Don’t think too hard about this one—just enjoy the sweetness of plotting revenge over cocktails (expensed, of course)....
Attention readers fed up with your jobs: call in sick tomorrow and dive into this debut crackling with the energy of handfuls of underpaid, underappreciated, tired-as-heck assistants hungry for what’s owed them.
Tina Fontana is a 30-year-old NYU graduate and executive assistant to billionaire Robert Barlow, CEO of major media company Titan Corporation. She knows the most intimate details of Robert’s life, saving the day for him constantly, and yet she’s stuck living paycheck to paycheck. What’s happened to her? How does she work so hard and never rise above being an assistant while the men around her make fortunes? The answer to Tina’s problems shows up in the form of an expense report. When she’s mistakenly reimbursed for a significantly large sum, she struggles with whether to report the error. For her, this could mean starting over debt free: “I could have savings….All at once I would become less anxious and more generous.” For Titan Corporation, the sum is measly. One major theme of Perri’s debut is this: “There is so much money.” Mostly in the hands of those who don’t deserve it. When Tina decides to keep the money and pay off her student loans, she doesn’t get off scot-free. Emily Johnson, the not-so-nice accounting assistant behind all the signatures, catches her. Now she has to figure out how to pay off Emily’s loans too (oh, and become her best friend), or Tina is as good as ruined. It doesn’t take long for rumors to spread and for Tina to become a hero, the Voice of the Assistant: “I could see how beneath all the lacquer these girls were hungry,” she realizes as her mission becomes greater than herself. Perri’s writing is quippy and the pace breezy; despite all the hurdles Tina has to leap over, things go pretty smoothly. Oh, and the hot, sensitive guy in the office? On her quest to take over Titan, Tina gets him too.
Don’t think too hard about this one—just enjoy the sweetness of plotting revenge over cocktails (expensed, of course). You’ll feel better after reading, promise.Pub Date: May 3, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-399-17254-0
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: Feb. 16, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
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