Story for the Week
Good and bad. Right and wrong. Positive and negative. Heaven and Hell. Virtue and vice.
I would like to think I’m mostly on the left side of all those combinations. I’m certainly not perfect, but I’m pretty boring if you’re looking for me to be in the bad/wrong/negative/Hell/vice category. I’ve never smoked. I’ve never tried any sort of illegal drug (not even marijuana since it became legal for recreational use). I don’t cheat and won’t tolerate a cheater. I try not to swear too much, although if you’re driving like an idiot, all bets are off. 😁 I drink alcohol, but not if I’m going to be driving and not to excess (at least not since my 20s). Like I said, I’m pretty boring.
I’m also old enough now to not have to worry about peer pressure to give in to vices. Oh sure, there was the pressure at work by one of my team members to use video chat. I pushed back (A LOT—self-proclaimed introvert here), but when I finally gave in, it wasn’t so bad. Even I will admit that it makes a huge difference when you work exclusively from home, which I did long before the pandemic. I will also admit to “pressuring” a couple other people to do the same. I know, I know…I’m such a horrible person. 🤣
I don’t remember being pressured to do things in high school, but if you’ve seen movies like Grease, American Graffiti, American Pie, you know that teenagers are constantly pressured to drink, smoke, have sex, sneak out. As the parent of a daughter, I am constantly having conversations about what she can and can’t wear out of the house because of the attention it might draw. School dress codes include clauses that are specifically targeted at girls, and that annoys our daughter to no end. She believes that she should be able to wear something appropriate that she’s comfortable in—and she’s right. Granted, a girl could probably go out in a burlap sack and get unwanted attention, but it saddens me to have to have those conversations.
The #metoo movement has turned a big spotlight on the gender imbalance, and while studies have shown that reports of sexual harassment have decreased, reports of gender harassment (hostility against women) are on the rise. I am thankful that I work for a company that actively promotes equality and diversity and does not tolerate any kind of harassment. The firm I worked for previously was the same. Our chairman regularly said that the company would stand behind its employees for anything with the exception of insider trading and sexual harassment. I have been very lucky.
I just finished reading a book about a woman trying to compete in a man’s world and giving in to the pressure to conform.
Book Review
⭐⭐⭐
3 Stars for The Boys’ Club by Erica Katz
345 pages
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Publication Date: August 4, 2020
I received an advance copy of this title from NetGalley and HarperCollins.
Publisher’s Description
Alex Vogel has always been a high achiever who lived her life by the book—star student and athlete in high school, pre-law whiz in college, Harvard Law School degree. Accepting a dream offer at the prestigious Manhattan law firm of Klasko & Fitch, she promises her sweet and supportive longtime boyfriend that the job won’t change her.
Yet Alex is seduced by the firm’s money and energy…and by her cocksure male colleagues, who quickly take notice of the new girl. She’s never felt so confident and powerful—even the innuendo-laced banter with clients feels fun. In the firm’s most profitable and competitive division, Mergers and Acquisitions, Alex works around the clock, racking up billable hours and entertaining clients late into the evening. While the job is punishing, it has its perks, like a weekend trip to Miami, a ride in a client’s private jet, and more expense-account meals than she can count.
But as her clients’ expectations and demands on her increase, and Alex finds herself magnetically drawn to a handsome coworker despite her loving relationship at home, she begins to question everything —including herself. She knows the corporate world isn’t black and white, and that to reach the top means playing by different rules. But who made those rules? And what if the system is rigged so that women can’t win, anyway?
When something happens that reveals the dark reality of the firm, Alex comes to understand the ways women like her are told—explicitly and implicitly—how they need to behave to succeed in the workplace. Now, she can no longer stand by silently— even if doing what’s right means putting everything on the line to expose the shocking truth.
************
Main Characters:
- Alex – new associate at Klasko & Fitch, fresh from Harvard Law
- Sam – Alex’s live-in boyfriend who is working on starting his own business
- Carmen – Alex’s classmate from law school who is also a new associate with Klasko & Fitch after a summer internship with the firm
- Nancy – new associate at Klasko & Fitch
- Kevin – new associate at Klasko & Fitch
- Derrick – new associate at Klasko & Fitch
- Gary Kaplan – Klasko & Fitch’s top M&A client
- Peter Dunn – one of Klasko & Fitch’s top M&A partners
- Jordan – an experienced Klasko & Fitch M&A associate
- Matt – chair of Klasko & Fitch’s M&A group
Erica Katz’s The Boys’ Club is a look at a powerful corporate Manhattan law firm through the eyes of a new associate during her first year. The author worked at a Manhattan law firm, so I assumed when I read the description that she would represent the culture accurately, and the premise of the story is women trying to be competitive in the traditionally male-dominated world of mergers and acquisitions.
Alex grew up in a small Connecticut town where her father is an oncologist and her mother volunteers at a library. They still call her Bunny, and she promises her longtime boyfriend that she will pursue a match to any group at Klasko & Fitch except M&A. Alex is about as straitlaced as you can get, so when she finds herself attracted to the pace and competitiveness of M&A, let’s just say she’s not so straitlaced after all.
The book is divided into six parts, each beginning with a legal definition (target list, NDA, indication of interest, etc.), which basically mirrors Alex’s life in her first year at the firm. Following each definition chapter is an Interstitial in which Alex is being questioned about the socialization practices at the firm as well as specifics about Gary Kaplan and Peter Dunn. We know from the questions that something serious happened, but we obviously don’t find out what until late in the book.
Everyone knows that attorneys are rumored to work killer hours, especially in Manhattan, and the attorneys at Klasko & Fitch are no exception. Alex regularly works through the night, catching a few hours of sleep at the office, working through holidays, cancelling plans with her boyfriend. The pace of Alex’s lifestyle is fast, and the book follows suit. It doesn’t take long for Alex to give in to pressure from her colleagues to stay out increasingly later drinking and drugging even when she’s not going to actually be working.
If the epilogue of the book is supposed to be present day, Alex’s first year is around four years ago, just before #metoo went viral, so the story itself is a lead-in to that without specifically mentioning the #metoo movement. In the male-dominated world Alex inhabits, she feels obligated to conform to compete and succeed. That’s what I liked about the book. Most women have been in that position in their careers. The question is how far do you go in giving up your values to do it?
What knocked this down to only three stars for me is that Alex became SO unlikeable so quickly. I understand that she is probably a realistic representation. As I mentioned, the author is an attorney. But when Alex is at a point of making things right, I feel like it’s too late. It’s really difficult to view her as redeemable by the time we get to the end of the story.
I know there will be plenty of people who rate this a five-star read, but I want my protagonists to retain some semblance of likeability if I’m supposed to actually like them at the end. Alex just doesn’t, and it kind of ruined it for me.
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