One Fifth Avenue by Candace Bushnell
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Book Reviews of One Fifth Avenue
Book Review: when's the move in date?
Summary: 4 Stars
Knowing when to poke fun at her own craft, Candace Bushnell springs forth yet another tale of elite New York womanhood and their Amazonian destruction on modern society. Their tongues wag, their credit cards fly, and their lipsticks smirk in this fun farce revolving around a New York apartment building set smack at the beginning of Fifth Avenue.
It is clear before the prologue concludes that one never really emotes to any of these people and the sycophants that cling to them for the publicity they could potentially offer. It's in this apathetic nature that their story unfolds before you on the page, playing out in five brilliant acts of campy glee. These women are truly wretched and you can't help but feel a bit like two of the characters in the novel: Lola Fabrikant and Thayer Core. Both are lurking around the perimeter of this expansive co-op, longing to be a part of the glitz and glamour despite the unfortunate incidents that occur inside. A dried up mogul, a magazine empress, a recovering author, an actress returning from Los Angeles failure, a hedge-fund tycoon with his endearingly naïve wife, and a best-selling author are all splayed out for these ripe young characters to leach on with us, siphoning out every last drop of what's left!
Ms. Bushnell is methodical with "One Fifth Avenue" and delivers the goods, with such an aloof air, you can't help but feel guilty for not caring an ounce for anyone involved. The fact that she shares in your glee and understands New York's own humoristic absurdity only keeps you coming back for more.
I finished this novel with the need to live inside this fictitious fabrication she had made! Here's to hoping someone else will move in and give us a sequel to latch onto!
Book Review: Real Estate is the New Black
Summary: 4 Stars
This novel, "One Fifth Avenue," gets its name from the Art Deco building in New York's ultra-hip Greenwich Village. Living there has a certain status to which the middle-aged main characters aspire. In "Sex and the City" it was shoes. In this book, it's real estate.
Mindy Gooch is the building's board president. She's a bitter blogger, whose husband, James, writes a commercially successful novel. Schiffer Diamond is an actress who has a relationship with a fellow tenant, a Pulitzer Prize and Oscar-winning author, Philip Oakland. Philip's Texan aunt, Enid Merle, is an 80-something gossip columnist; and the woman who has turned Philip's head is a schemer named Lola Fabrikant (what a name!) The designated bald, gay man is Billy Litchfield and the designated beauty queen is Annalisa Rice, who gets a strong lesson in the social rules of One Fifth Avenue. As a host of characters come and go (a LOT to keep track of particularly at first), the story is filled with competition for success and sexual tension and ultimately pulls together. There are philosophical generational conflicts (middle-age characters are "snobby," and 20-something characters are "without conscience") coupled with the age-old conflict of old and new money.
Like Candace Bushnell's previous books, it's more about colorful characters than good writing. I believe both "Sex and the City" and "Lipstick Jungle" made better television series than books and my guess is the same is true for this title. 3.5 stars.
Michele Cozzens is the author of It's Not Your Mother's Bridge Club.
Book Review: Guilty pleasure with sharp, critical observations about NYC life
Summary: 4 Stars
It's popcorn, but it's also not shallow.
Overall this book was enjoyable. The theme, I think, is that although the players might change, the play stays the same in the NYC rat race. So it goes with this particular set of characters, not all likeable, but that's the point. Bushnell really goes through the privileges, prejudices, aspirations and problems of these very New York City characters, whose lives intersect only because they live in the same building. (And anyone who has ever lived in NYC will surely report how oddly familial and important your neighbors can be in your existence -- in both good and bad ways!).
I think the novel works because it is full of both superficial guilty pleasure and sharp critical observations. There are some real barbs about age and aging in general -- the arrogance of youth, the strains of success and failure in middle age, and the inevitable process of aging. What I liked best about the novel is how Bushnell reminds the reader that TMZ and Perez Hilton didn't invent scandal...gossip, social power plays and social climbing have been around for a long time, and are perhaps even a fundamental component of any social scene (in this case wealthy, downtown NYC). That's the point, the story itself is just a light and entertaining way to explore the good and bad realities of social interaction and strategy.
Not a literary classic, but easy juicy reading.
Book Review: Like porn, pointless, but you cannot put it down
Summary: 4 Stars
As usual, Bushnell writes about a most eclectic group of people, all money hungry, selfish, greedy, promiscuous and never satisfied with what they have. The most normal character in the book was an adolescent boy. Everybody has more money than they know what to do with it, but never enough. I was both appalled and entranced. It was like reading porn. Is utterly pointless, but you cannot put it down. You have two men that think with their lower body organs instead of their actual head, a woman that will sleep with whomever to live in a particular building, an actress that is weary of lying in the bed she made, a mom with a married life very similiar to the rest of us folks, an old busy body, and of course, a possibly gay fellow. And let us not forget the filthy rich and high and mighty upstairs. This book follows their lives and it is shocking how their choices and situations entwine. I could not put it down. Bushnell somehow does it again. There is quite possibly a moral in this novel. "Treat others as you would like to be treated.." OR "Be nice to a fellow today cause he may be your boss tomorrow." One never knows who will rise above or fall below. You may be pleasantly surprised.Book Review: Highly entertaining
Summary: 4 Stars
Candace Bushnell's "One Fifth Avenue" revolved around a historic Manhattan building where residents were artsy and somewhat rich. Things became complicated when one of its resident died and there was a vacancy in the building. Soon, Annalisa and her hedge-funder husband, Paul Rice moved in and began to change the way things were done in the building, especially since they were a lot richer than the rest of the residents. The other residents included Philip Oakland, a famous writer with his young girlfriend, his aunt, a columnist who also owned a unit there, and Mindy Gooch, the annoying and also the head of the resident board.
This was an extremely fun read for me, as Bushnell wrote about the gossips and the social happenings involving the residents. I was surprised that the book was quite engaging as I was lost at the beginning with the introduction of so many characters. All the characters in the book were not necessary unique but were definitely captivating and I can see the book being made into a movie or a TV series. Highly recommended!