Sohn's novel lampoons a specific neighborhood - the ultra-yuppie, ultra-P.C, ultra-stroller-mobbed-out, beyond-parody Brooklyn neighborhood that's a byword for "smugness" and nice houses in the tri-State area. But she could just as easily be talking about parent populations all across the country - and online. These are the women who populate the "momopshere," those fabled helicopter parents who assume everyone shares the same level of fascination with their children's diets and can afford to worry about the provenance of a cloth diaper.
via jezebel.com[
I'm using this as a way to test the remote posting device on my TypePad blog, so forgive me if this comes out looking crappy.
OK here's the thing about this book: It's readable, and funny in spots, yet awful in that way a book so clearly written to be picked up for a TV show can be. This is what I imagine a Jennifer Weiner TV show would be like, except there'd be a fat chick whereas in this book there's one chubby woman, who also happens to be a complete psychotic freak. If you ever wondered whether the Sex and the City ladies would be as annoying as at-home moms as they are as singletons, the answer is yes. Also, at this point in 2009, the lux goods worship and obsessive wealth seems dated.
When I finished Prospect Park West, I gave it to my mom to read last Saturday at the Shore. "You can probably get through this tonight," I said. "Tell me if it's my imagination."
The next afternoon when we returned from the beach, she said "Yeah, I finished this one. The bit with her burning her hair off was good but it reads like it's a TV script or something."
Like I said, it'll make for pretty TV and cast properly it could be a "thirtysomething"-like phenomenon. But dropping lots of pop cultural and brand references (and there are too many in this book to count) into a book is not exactly the same as writing one. Or is it (see Mad Men)?
And while there certainly are women who inhabit the same demographic and political structure as these women -- except perhaps Melora Leigh, an Oscar-winning actress married to a philandering Australian hottie -- none of them seem even vaguely real. There's plenty of internal dialogue and glances toward the usual parenting neuroses, but nothing that feels genuine.
UPDATE: Author Amy Sohn has a beef with anonymous, mean-spirited bloggers, even the ones who don't write anonymously and who actually read their entire book before writing a review. Sometimes the book just isn't very good, hon.
