Everyone Worth Knowing

Everyone Worth Knowing

Binding: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.6
Format: Bargain Price
Label: Simon & Schuster
Manufacturer: Simon & Schuster
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 384
Publication Date: October 04, 2005
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Sales Rank: 441682
Studio: Simon & Schuster

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Editorial Review:

Product Description:
WHAT HAPPENS WHEN A GIRL ON THE FRINGE ENTERS THE REALM OF NEW YORK'S CHIC, PARTY-HOPPING ELITE?

Soon after Bette Robinson quits her horrendous Manhattan banking job like the impulsive girl she's never been, the novelty of walking her four-pound dog around her unglamorous Murray Hill neighborhood wears as thin as the 'What are you going to do with your life?' phone calls from her parents. Then Bette meets Kelly, head of Manhattan's hottest PR firm, and suddenly she has a brand-new job where the primary requirement is to see and be seen inside the VIP rooms of the city's most exclusive nightclubs. But when Bette begins appearing in a vicious new gossip column, she realizes that the line between her personal and professional life is...invisible.

Amazon.com Review:
Lauren Weisberger, whose bestselling debut The Devil Wears Prada outed the vicious antics of the magazine industry elite, is back at it with Everyone Worth Knowing, another cautionary tale of sex, power, and fame. This time around, the PR industry is her target, and Prada fans will recognize similar themes throughout this entertaining, if at times overly dramatic, exposé.

Bette Robinson is a twentysomething Emory graduate who shunned her parents' hippie ideals in favor of a high-paying yet excruciatingly boring job at a prestigious investment bank. One day, after a particularly condescending exchange with her boss (who sends her daily inspirational e-mails), Bette walks out on her job in a huff. After a few weeks of sleeping late, watching Dr. Phil and entertaining her dog Millington, Bette's uncle scores her a job at an up-and-coming public relations firm, where her entire job seems to revolve around staying out late partying and providing fodder for clandestine gossip columns. What follows is one episode after another of Bette climbing up the social ladder at the expense of her friends, family, and the one guy who actually seems worth pursuing.

Weisberger is clever enough to turn seemingly outrageous circumstances into amusing anecdotes, like the tale of a woman who was close to suicide until she found out she was only 18 months away from scoring a highly coveted Birkin bag ('You simply cannot kill yourself when you're that close ... it's just not an option.'). This wit, combined a hint of voyeurism that most of us can't deny, is what makes Everyone Worth Knowing a guilty pleasure that's well worth the indulgence. --Gisele Toueg

The Significant Seven with Lauren Weisberger
Lauren graciously agreed to answer the questions we like to ask every author.

Q: What book has had the most significant impact on your life?
A: Very tough question. For the first half of my life, it would definitely have to be Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret by Judy Blume. I worshipped that book. Recently, I'd say that it was Empire Falls by Richard Russo. Even though there's not a tremendous amount of action, the characters are brilliant. It's a hauntingly realistic depiction of small-town America. And the place descriptions are so compelling that the book is compulsively page-turning.

Q: You are stranded on a desert island with only one book, one CD, and one DVD--what are they?
A: This is not the time for self-improvement, that's for sure--they'd all have to be 100% entertainment. For book it would have to be The Last of the California Girls, a random novel that I've read 2,000 times; for CD I would say Monster Ballads, the album of cheesy 80's love songs that I ordered from an 800-number, and for DVD, it would be Dirty Dancing, of course.

Q: What is the worst lie you've ever told?
A: That one's easy. It goes something like this: 'Hi, (insert editor's name here)! Yes, of course, it's already finished. I'm just tweaking a few sentences, and I'll have the whole draft to you by Monday, latest.'

Q: Describe the perfect writing environment.
A: For me, the best writing environments are all about deprivation and the removal of temptation. Therefore, anywhere on earth where there's no TV, no phone, no internet access, no friends, and no fridge is pretty much perfect.

Q: If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?
A: I really don't want to think about this one, but if I HAVE to, I hope it would include a few keywords like 'brilliant,' 'supremely talented,' and 'drop-dead gorgeous.'

Q: Who is the one person living or dead that you would like to have dinner with?
A: I'm supposed to say Hemingway or Moses or Madonna, right? It'd probably just be my sister, Dana. We already have a lot of dinners together, so I know it's a guaranteed good laugh.

Q: If you could have one superpower, what would it be?
A: The ability to be invisible! It would make all my current spying/stalking/staring SO much easier.

Lauren Weisberger's List of Books You Should Read

so80s

Marjorie Morningstar

Kissing in Manhattan

Bright Lights, Big City

Glamorama

See more recommendations from Lauren Weisberger

Customer Reviews

Average Rating: out of 5 stars

Rating:

- The Tome of Spoiled Entitlement (the Sequel)
This is basically a derivative of The Devil Wears Prada, which read well because it is a thinly-veiled stab at Anna Wintour (a real person) and Vogue (a real magazine). A lot of people read Vogue and enjoy fashion, either directly, or from an armchair, so it's fun to watch them get lambasted, and because people are familiar with it, there's something relateable about The Devil Wears Prada.

But who wants to be a party planner? I kept on recalling that episode of Friends that Winona Rider guested on, where her character changed careers because she "wanted to help people," so she became a party planner. At least then, the whole idea was funny because it was done ironically. Not so with Everyone Worth Knowing. Lauren Weisberger paints the job like the most glamorous job in the world, and yet all the main character does is whine about how awful it is, and how it's killing her soul and messing up her social life, etc.

So, not only is it a derivative of The Devil Wears Prada, it's not even good. And when the main character isn't out partying, she's lazing about her apartment in sweatpants whining about how horrible her life is. Also, she wants to be a writer, and everyone tells her how she would be such a great writer, which is another retread of The Devil Wears Prada, and a bit Mary Sue-ish to boot.

Ergo, you're better off re-reading Prada rather than reading this book. Or better yet, see the Prada movie.

Rating:

- fun chick-lit
I liked this better than The Devil Wears Prada. Yes, it's predictable but it's fun for a weekend of light reading. Bette is a party planner/publicist in NYC who is addicted to reading romance novels - how serious of a book can this be? Don't take this book as a piece of classic literature. Enjoy it for what it is and have fun!

Rating:

- Blah, blah, Gucci, blah, bleh...I need an advil.
I tried to like this book, but it was awful & disappointing and the author disappointed me as well. I just listened to the audio version from the library & heard it at work, so thankfully no money was spent. I should have known from the start where the story would end up.I willingly kept on listening, hoping that somehow it should get better, but I couldn't even make it to the end! It's basically the same "Devil Wears Prada" story with different names for the characters. There was no substance, no life & just a bunch of name drop babbling. The author clearly did not know how the NYC nightlife really was & wrote about it the way she was "imagining" it, making it sound SO cliché & Hollywood.(& I know this being a NYC & NJ transplant) There were also some racist stereotypical remarks that were messed up, not to mention, just plain wrong! Most of the characters in the story were annoying & frustrating, especially the main character because all she did was complain about how awful her fabulous life was. I just could not take a liking toward her. Read the book if you don't want to think, but beware, you might get a migraine from all the dead mindless words.

Rating:

- Not worth It
Picked this one up because I found the "Devil Wears Prada" good for a light read when traveling.

The cover of Everyone Worth Knowing touted the fact that is was written by the same author in almost the same font size as the title.

That should have warned me : Be wary when someone is trying too hard.

The theme here is vaguely similar to the original bestseller, Bette the main protagonist is sick of her job in banking, her boss and his daily inspirational emails with quotations. One day she quits her job in disgust and then spends the next couple of weeks vegetating in her house.

Her well known columnist uncle, Will uses his connections to get her a job at an up and coming boutique PR firm where partying hard is part of her job.

The rest of the book is a constant whine of how terrible Bette's life is and how she isn't happy with what she is doing but still keeps doing it anyway.

This book has none of the humor of the first, or something enlightening like a window into the fashion magazine industry that the first book provided.

This book just talks about the parties the PR folks attend where they drink, do drugs and have random hookups with barely any insight into the inner workings of the PR industry.

This book is a combination of gossip pages, Harlequin romances (which Bette incidentally favours and even has monthly book club meetings to discuss them) and poor me whining.

The book is ... Read More

Rating:

- Very entertaining
I realy enjoyed this book. It was very entertaining and exciting to read how Bette's love life and career took a 180 degree turn to the wild and crazy. I can't wait to read the next book by Lauren!

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