fashion

Written in a deliciously racy style that is supremely witty and tongue-in-cheek "The Devil Wears Prada" is trendy, sassy and gossipy. Through her refreshingly breathless and feisty narration, Weisberger provides the ultimate behind-the-scenes-look at the world of fashion journalism.
The amazing action-packed and ordeal-filled odyssey begins when 23-year-old Andrea Sachs, a small-town girl, fresh out of college, drops off her résumé at one of the most famed addresses in high-fashion publication - the stately Elias-Clarke building, Madison Avenue, New York City - without expecting even so much as a callback!
To her huge, huge surprise, she gets hired to be the assistant to the planet's most fashionable fashion editor - Miranda Priestly - in the world's most prestigious fashion magazine.
The book takes the reader up-close to the epicenter of haute-couture where the most dazzling soirees, suave gay hair colorists, $10,000 designer handbags, Prada shoes, mink furs (and the list is never ending, of course), blend into an intoxicating mélange. But it is also a reminder that all that glitters is not gold.
From the day she sets foot on the dripping-with-Versace-and-Dior sovereign soil of the Runway magazine, Andrea never has a turmoil-free, trouble-free and fear-free moment in her life. Through a narration which is at all times feisty, and which at some of the times, even has sardonic humor, she describes what it's like to work for the bitchiest boss ever.
The icy-cold, ceaselessly condescending and ruthlessly demanding Priestly treats her army of employees like slaves, with the utmost feudal attitude not seen since the days of the Greek City States. With just a steely look and a clipped, British-accent, she has metamorphosed many a full-fledged editors into mere minions, all at her beck and call. Andrea is no exception. Her highly sought-after job is in fact, a living nightmare, a travesty of a job!
What makes this book so unique is that it gives a decidedly mundane theme - employer-employee interaction at the workplace - such an exciting twist.

OK, we get it. Andrea Sachs has the worst boss ever. That's about all you need to know about Lauren Weisberger's novel "The Devil Wears Prada."

True, the title is great, and so the subject matter could have been. Instead, though, the book is a seemingly endless litany of all of the insane things fashion editor Miranda Priestly does or demands her peon assistant to do or get for her, and the gag grows old. Undoubtedly, Priestly is pathetic, unable (or just unwilling) to do even the simplest task for herself, while demanding others do the impossible. (It's a thinly veiled secret that Priestly is based on Anna Wintour, the famously icy editor of Vogue, and the fictional Elias-Clark Company is of course Conde Nast.) Weisberger has some fun mocking the Manolo-clad fashion assistants she calls "Clackers," as well as the fabulous, excessive Conde Nast cafeteria. And Miranda's craziness is a scream, but that's where the fun ends.

The problem lies with the protagonist herself. She doesn't have to be likeable, but she could at least be interesting. Instead, Andrea Sachs is a whiny, spoiled brat who thinks the world should just fall at her feet. She makes no attempt to hide the fact that she thinks working at a fashion magazine is completely insignificant and beneath her. We may be able to identify with having a hellish job, but the thing is, that doesn't make us sympathize with her. Everyone, unless they come from extreme privilege or just have damn good luck, has had a horrendous first job or a terrible boss, so we don't exactly feel sorry for her when she must deal with Miranda's antics. In fact, Andrea has such a sense of entitlement, such a ridiculous superiority complex, that we almost smile when she must search block after block for an antique store Miranda remembers seeing once. It's as if no one ever had a bad job or a crazy boss until Andrea did, and of course, hers is the worst of the worst. The ironic thing is that just as her boss is completely wrapped up in herself, so too is Andrea. She may not get to order assistants around, but her inability to see beyond her own nose makes her just as insufferable.

And her personal life? Wish I could tell you, but I skipped those chapters. They weren't particularly interesting or enlightening. (Yes, we know the housing market in New York is ridiculous. And gee, it's awful, isn't it, when an attractive, wealthy, amazing writer for the New Yorker pursues you?) Besides this, her constant moaning that no one understands just how horrendous her job is and that no one has a job worse than hers wears thin almost immediately. Sachs doesn't even appear to learn anything from her whole ordeal and doesn't seem to be aware of her spoiled behavior, which is perhaps the most obnoxious and annoying thing about the character.

Andrea wants to work at the New Yorker, the sterling example of good writing. But if Weisberger's writing is any indication, the New Yorker won't come calling anytime soon. Boring and repetitive by the halfway mark, the novel reads like a first or second draft, not a polished, finished product. The dialogue is stilted and wooden, and the prose is so ungrammatical, I found myself having to reread or just skip passages altogether. Granted, it's not intended to be Tolstoy, but there is an art to comedic writing, as evidenced by Helen Fielding's Bridget Jones books and even, "The Nanny Diaries," whose "expose your boss" style the book emulates.

Unfortunately, Weisberger falls short of both, leaving us to wonder what the novel would have been in the hands of a better or more perceptive writer.

I was excited to see that this book had finally been released on paperback so I picked it up immediately. However, it was very disappointing. The book is a 400-page rant from a selfish, boring character that we've seen millions of times before (think blonde, blue eyed, naive, small-town girl..) The author writes as though she is an expert in her field dishing the dirt - meanwhile the info in this book is common knowledge and there are even some things I find incorrect. Also, it is not particularly well-written or articulate. The author tends to go into such detail about daily trips to Starbucks but briefly mulls over entire months of the protagonist's life.

It may be a cute read for younger women or those who are really curious about the fashion industry.