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Executive Times |
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2007 Book Reviews |
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The Manny
by Holly Peterson |
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Rating: |
*** |
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(Recommended) |
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Click on
title or picture to buy from amazon.com |
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Romance I expected to
hate reading Holly Peterson’s debut novel, The Manny.
I anticipated that the writing from a billionaire’s (Pete Peterson of
Blackstone) daughter would not have been formed through the experiences of a
poor starving artist. While the setting is the wealthy and wealthier of the
Upper West Side in “Hurry, we gotta talk.” My Korean colleague, Abby Chong, had spotted me across the crowded newsroom as our
colleagues completed a live newsbreak of a space shuttle landing. I passed
the rows of cubicles and said hello to some of the twenty-something P.A.’s inside, most of them looking like they hadn’t
slept in days. I navigated the portable screening machines lined outside the
cubicles, tapes piled precariously on top. In my ears, I heard the familiar
cacophony of ringing phones, the tapping of computer keyboards, and the audio
of dozens of televisions and radios going at once. Abby grabbed my elbow and
pulled me toward my door. I managed to pick up three newspapers from the
pile. “You almost knocked my
coffee on the floor!” I looked down at a few drops on my new blouse. “Sorry,” Abby answered.
“I’m tired. I’m frazzled. But you’ve got bigger problems now.” “Really big? Like your Pope
problems?” “No. Crazy Anchorman’s off
that. Now Goodman wants a Madonna interview.” “How do you get from an
exclusive with the Pope to an exclusive with Madonna?” “The cross thing. The
crucifixion stunt at her concert from a while ago. He went to a dinner party
last night. Sat next to someone who convinced him she would appeal to the
eighteen-to-forty-nine demo. He decided she was edgier than the Pope. But
only after we were here till four a.m. doing research. He used the ‘fresh’
word. Everything had to be fresh. He
wanted Pope references from the Bible so he could write a letter to the Pope
and quote them. I told him there weren’t any. He said, ‘He’s the Pope, for
Christ’s sake—find them!” “Well, I won’t be working
on Madonna either. I don’t produce celebrity profiles. It’s in my contract.” “You’re not going to get
another contract when you hear what shit you’re in.” I figured she was
overreacting. Abby was always calm when we were live and rolling, and a
nervous wreck the rest of the time—like now. Her black hair was clipped on
the top of her head like a witch doctor, and she was wearing a bright violet
suit that looked simply awful on her. She pushed me into my office and closed
the door behind her. “Sit down,” she said, while
she paced around the room. “You mind if I take my coat
off?” “Fine. But hurry up.” “Just give me two minutes,
please?” I hung my coat on the hanger behind my door, sat down, and took my
cranberry scone out of the bag. “Okay, Abby What’s got you so wound up this
time?” She leaned over the top of
my desk with her arms straight out. She didn’t hesitate, no niceties, just
delivered the fatal news. “Theresa Boudreaux granted
the interview to Kathy Seebright. They taped it on Monday in
an undisclosed location. It’s airing this Thursday on the News Hour. Drudge already has it on
his website.” She sat down and her left
knee bounced uncontrollably I laid my head facedown on the desk with a thunk. “You’re screwed. No other
word for it. I’m sorry Goodman’s not in yet, but apparently our fearless
leader called him fifteen minutes ago to give him the news. So the two big
cheeses already know.” I struggled to look up. “Is
Goodman trying to reach me?” “I don’t know. I tried your
cell, but it went straight to voicemail.” I fished my cell phone out
of my purse by pulling the cord for my earpiece. The ringer had been in the
“off” position since last night and I had forgotten to switch it back. Six
messages. I plugged the phone into the charger on my desk. Nausea roiled up
inside me. It didn’t help that I’d swallowed a bunch of vitamins on an empty
stomach. I ripped apart the cranberry scone, picked out a few berries, and
lined them up while I thought about my next move. “Give me a sec to figure
out how to handle this disaster.” “I’m here waiting.” She
leaned back in her chair with her arms crossing her chest. Abby was a very
pretty woman who, at forty-two, looked young for her age, with her straight
hair and creamy Asian skin. She was head researcher on the show, and during
live broadcasts always sat off-camera five feet from our anchor, Joe Goodman.
On the console in front of her were thousands of index cards with any fact
and figure a pompous newsman could want in an instant: type of armored tank
most commonly used in the Iraq War, number of passengers killed on Pan Am
Flight 103, and biographies of important historical figures like Kato Kaelin and Robert Kardashian. I rattled off some options.
“I could just apologize to Goodman right now before he comes charging in
here. Preemptive action is always good.” Deep breath. “I could listen to my
messages to see if that Boudreaux lawyer bothered to give me a heads-up that
his client was talking to another network. He only promised me the interview
on Friday. No wonder he didn’t return my calls over the weekend.” I moved the
piles of broadcast tapes to create some space on my desk, and they slid to
the floor like a mudslide. “I thought the interview
was yours.” Abby was trying to help. “Really I did, especially after your
charm-offensive trip last week—I thought you’d nailed it down. Goodman’ll be here in fifteen minutes. Check your
messages first so you sound on the ball, even though.
.
.“ “Even though what?” Even
though I had lost the biggest “get” of the year to a perky blonde: Kathy Seebright, Abby shrugged. Even she
didn’t know I’d left work early on Friday to take my daughter to her ballet
class. They’d probably assumed I was out greasing the wheels for the
interview. Sometimes sexy women like
to act stupid because it helps them get exactly what they want. Theresa
Boudreaux was one of those types: a bodacious waffle house waitress with a
devilish streak. Unfortunately for a certain high-ranking elected leader, she
had the wits to go to Radio Shack and buy herself a nine-dollar
phone-recording device. She then used it to tape her dirty phone calls with
U.S. Congressman Huey Hartley, a powerful, sanctimonious,
married-for-thirty-years politician from the solidly Red State of
Mississippi. When network news anchors lose interviews like this one, they
get mean and scary That’s why producers call them anchor monsters whether
they just lost an interview or not. They’re scary people even when they’re
trying to be nice. But no one was being nice to me that day. For a moment, I thought I’d
be fired. In my defense, I really thought we had it. I grabbed my cell phone. Message number four was in
fact Theresa Boudreaux’s lawyer calling at ten last night. What a sleazebag.
Just after the Seebright interview was in the can,
he thought he should tell me that things had changed. “Jamie, it’s
Leon Rosenberg. Thank you again for the flowers on Friday. My wife thought
they were beautiful. Uh, we need to discuss some changes in the plan.Theresa Boudreaux has had some concerns. Call me at
home tonight.You have all my numbers.” I dialed “I’m sorry, Ms.Whitfield. I’m not sure where he is right now, so I
can’t connect you. Is there a message?” “Yes. Could you please
write this down verbatim: ‘I heard about Seebright. Fuck you very
much. From Jamie Whitfield.” “I don’t think it’s
appropriate to write that down.” “Mr. Rosenberg won’t be
surprised. He’ll think it’s appropriate given the situation. Please pass it
along.” I hung up. The writing is
generally weak, and it’s hard to have empathy for any of the characters.
Their pain becomes evident, and romance and love become clear enough, but by
the end it was hard to care. The Manny
is not the successor to Bonfire of the
Vanities, but it was better than I expected, and by the end it was actually
kind of sweet. It was like being dragged to a chick flick, and coming out of
the theater feeling better than when you went in. You shouldn’t go out of way
to read The
Manny, but on a hot summer’s day, it provided a few hours of
entertainment and distraction. Steve Hopkins,
August 25, 2007 |
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The recommendation rating for
this book appeared in the September
2007 issue of Executive Times URL for this review: http://www.hopkinsandcompany.com/Books/The
Manny.htm For Reprint Permission,
Contact: Hopkins & Company, LLC • E-mail: books@hopkinsandcompany.com |
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