Confessions of a sociopathic social climber : the Katya chronicles

Format:

Audio disc

Title:

Confessions of a sociopathic social climber : the Katya chronicles

Author:

Lang, Adèle.

ISBN:

9781559278188

Publication Information:

Los Angeles, Calif. : Audio Renaissance, ℗2002, [1998]

Physical Description:

6 audio discs (approximately 6 hr., 30 min.) : digital ; 4 3/4 in.

General Note:

Unabridged.

Compact disc.

Summary:

When tax inspectors question some of her work-related expenses, writer Katla Kivingston begins keeping a financial diary. But what starts as a private account becomes, through Katla's delusions of grandeur, a matter of public record, first as a tawdry gossip column, then as a salacious book, and finally as a morally reprehensible grade-B movie.

Reading Level:

Mature audiences.

Subject(s):

Young women -- Fiction.

Women in the advertising industry -- Fiction.

Geographic Term:

Genre:

Added Author:

Holds:

Available:*

Library	Call Number	Status
Searching... McMinnville Public Library	Lang, A.	Searching... Unknown

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Summary

After weasel-eyed tax inspectors question her work-related claims, Katya Livingston is forced to keep a financial diary. As well as documenting the cruel and parsimonious ways of her ad agency boss, plus her harrowing business trips around the globe, Katya waxes lyrical about the price she has to pay for putting up with loser friends, mortal enemies, and thoroughly bad restaurants. She also throws in a completely candid account of her rich and varied love life, just in case some of it is tax deductible. What begins as a private account of expenses rapidly becomes, through Katya's chronic delusions of grandeur, a matter of public record: first as a tawdry gossip column, then as a salacious book, and finally as a Hollywood B-movie. Bitingly written with wit and style reminiscent of Candace Bushnell, Adegrave;le Lang's novel is a cutting, bitchy, hilarious take on the young-single-British-woman genre.

Reviews (2)

Publisher's Weekly Review

A single, saucy British woman delivers her narcissistic rants in diary form (sound familiar?) in Adele Lang's Confessions of a Sociopathic Social Climber. Katya Livingston is a vain, nasty advertising copywriter who lands a gig producing a gossip column for a London tabloid - really just an outlet to crow about her prolific intake of alcohol and the search for "bonkable bachelors." The column leads to a book deal and even a brush with B-movie stardom as Katya rails against vegans, foreigners and the poorly dressed. What this sendup of the tired Bridget genre lacks in originality is made up for in sheer bitchiness. (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Kirkus Review

A first novel from Britisher Lang (How to Spot a Bastard by His Star Sign, 2002) offers up some sharp and funny moments, but with bad behavior its only joke, it quickly becomes exceedingly thin stuff. A self-absorbed, 30ish copywriter with an off-the-charts sense of herself, Katya Livingston smokes in the elevator because it's banned in the office, uses her Save-the-Children orphan as her personal porter, and for entertainment tempts the fiances of friends. The story consists of Katya's journal entries, published in her own newspaper column, a writing job that she finessed behind the back of Teddington, a friend who hoped to secure it for himself. Along with Eliza, a New Age colleague; Ferguson, a failed gay male escort; and a few others, Teddington is among the friends Katya constantly uses, abuses, and then humiliates in her column, attributing any resentments to jealousy. Novelistic concerns like plot and character don't apply in what is really just a string of farcical sketches that play off the Bridget Jones style. As such, it indeed has its moments, as when we find Katya, "manhunting" by setting a tripwire in Hyde Park, "After collecting only two old ladies and a poodle, get disheartened and go home again." In addition to the failures and embarrassments of her (barely) one-dimensional friends and colleagues, Katya's column chronicles her adventures looking for free drinks, higher-paying work, and a man up to her standards (she never finds one, tossing candidates aside like candy wrappers), writing for a TV series, house-sitting for a rich friend ("accidentally" losing her prize dog because he's a bother), fabricating a libelous book about a semi-famous ex-lover's shortcomings, then becoming the subject of a similar book by Teddington-and finally heading off to Hollywood to become a (pornographic) movie star. There are some real laughs here, and the complete lack of redeeming value is refreshing. But the entirety is another demonstration that less is more. Take in small doses.