Everyone Worth Knowing (Lauren Weisberger)*

It’s hard to believe Everyone Worth Knowing came from the person who inspired that wonderful film, The Devil Wears Prada. Lauren Weisberger’s first novel surely must have been so much better written and constructed than this in order for someone to spot its big screen potential – but why would anyone write trash like Everyone Worth Knowing when they were capable of better?

The writing is inaccessible. Weisberger’s style is clunky and amateurish, and sometimes it was a real effort to read it and to understand what she was on about. Parts of it were probably supposed to be funny – the film of The Devil Wears Prada was certainly amusing in parts - but it was so difficult to find the humour in this pile of crap. The story was almost identical to The Devil Wears Prada - it’s about party planning instead of fashion, but both protagonists move into a shallow world; get sucked into it; become very successful, before ultimately deciding it’s not for them. But whereas Andrea in The Devil Wears Prada is (at least in the film) sweet, kind, extremely hard-working and grateful to have the job even though it isn’t really what she was looking for, Everyone Worth Knowing’s Bette is a selfish cow.

Oh, she basically has the right attitude – she knows that it is more important to be a nice person than to be someone who dates celebrities. But the problem is that she not only considers herself a nice person, which she isn’t, she also thinks she’s a better person than almost everyone she meets.

Bette takes real pleasure in disliking her new workmate Elisa, who is actually very nice for a shallow drug addict. While it might be true that Elisa was not hugely welcoming to Bette on her first day at work, she seemed fairly friendly to me, and she was probably very busy. And who says Bette deserves a big welcome anyway? She’s very lucky even to have a job. Just because they’re in the business of party planning, it doesn’t mean her new workmates have to throw a party just because Bette has arrived.

Bette also looks down on her poor friend Penelope, and it’s really not surprising Penelope comes to resent her because I do too. Penelope is sweet and well-meaning, and eager to see the best in people, so it is genuinely sad when things go wrong for her. It’s difficult to feel a great deal of sympathy for Bette when there are much nicer people in the book who are having a worse time than she is.

Bette’s dislike for old university ‘friend’ Abigail is more reasonable, but Bette could still have been polite. For one thing, she shouldn’t insist on calling her ‘Abby’ when she’s said she prefers Abigail now. That’s just antagonistic. She shouldn’t sneer, even if she thinks Abigail sneered at her first. Abigail might be a silly bitch, but, if Bette had shown her some respect from the start, maybe Abigail would have responded in kind. As it is, she’s bringing herself down to what she perceives as Abigail’s level.

Bette does learn a few things from her mistakes, but it’s really too late by then. It’s okay for characters to make mistakes – it would probably be an even worse book if Bette was as perfect as she thinks she is. But Bette has no charm. She’s brittle and spiky, and always thinks she knows best. Jane Fallon got away with writing about a not very likeable heroine in Getting Rid of Matthew, but you do need considerable humour, not to mention writing talent, in order to get away with this, and Weisberger just isn’t good enough.

But one thing I will say for Bette is that she has fantastic taste in men. She quite rightly has no interest in the ridiculous Philip, the celebrity everyone thinks she’s shagging. The man she likes, bouncer Sammy, who won’t take any crap from Bette, is absolutely adorable. The fact that he likes Bette is probably his only bad point. But his affection appears sincere, as though he has seen some very well-hidden depths in her.

As for the plot, very little happens. It’s just party after party. One of the main parts of the plot is the trouble caused by an anonymous gossip columnist. I didn’t guess who that was, but it was fairly easy to guess who else was involved in it.

I bought The Devil Wears Prada from a charity shop because I loved the film, and I don’t believe it can really be as bad as this rubbish. But a glance at the first paragraph says I could be wrong.