How to Lose Friends and Alienate People
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I was so excited when I finally got my hands on a copy of How to Lose Friends and Alienate People by Toby Young. I had heard all sorts of rumors about this book, and was eager to find out how much of it was true. Amongst other things, reviews promised the book would shed an unforgiving light on the elite world of New York journalism in the nineties. More specifically, I was hoping it would tell me more about the mysterious ways of the so-called Condé Nasties. The journalists who work for Condé Nast, like the ones at Vogue, have been a source of inspiration for other authors as well (The Devil Wears Prada being the most recent and popular example), but until a while ago, they remained a mysterious breed to me.
Well, let’s just say Toby Young didn’t try to keep a bit of that mystery around. At least not for long. The book, which is conceived as Toby’ memoir, narrates the author’s rise and fall in the New York social scene and journalist spheres. Though it has to be said, it was a short and unsuccessful rise, and a cruelly devastating fall. But that’s what makes this book so much fun to read. Young is a master at self-effacing humor, without that irritating self-pitying streak. He’s harsh about everything and everyone, but that includes himself. This is why the book comes across as brutally (really brutally!) honest.
Toby’s big problem is that he is too obsessed with celebrities and fame. It might not even be an exaggeration to state the real reason why Young left for NY, was to be able to eat, sleep and party at the same places as his idols. Needless to say, his journalistic work suffers from his star-struck condition, and so does his social life. We watch Toby make one faux-pas after the other, and as painful it must have been for him, it is delightful for us to read about!
Truth to be told, I liked the parts best in which Young trash-talked some of the famous people. His descriptions of New York journalist royalty such as Graydon Carter (the editor-in-chief of Vanity Fair) and Tina Brown (former editor of Vanity Fair and The New Yorker) are ruthless, but his feelings about them do seem earnest. It really isn’t so much a roman-à-clef as a direct attack on these personalities, who are, if we are to believe Young (and I do), really just phoney and superficial hypocrites. Admittedly, the book doesn’t exactly encourage young international journalists to cross the pond and try to make it in the Big Apple, like Toby tried.
How to Lose Friends also has a more sentimental storyline, which revolves around Young’s personal life. Just like his professional endeavors, most of his romantic escapades end badly. But he describes them in such a funny way, you won’t feel too bad for him. Besides, it’s hard to feel bad for a narrator who is as self-absorbed, arrogant and superficial as Young. Yet he did change a little in the five year period which he spent in NYC, and this evolution is recorded in a rather credible way. In the end, you have no problem accepting Young’s slightly philosophical reflections on his adventures. It’s certainly enlightening to learn his view on America as a ‘fake’ meritocracy.
All in all, this book mixes hilarity, refined humor and deeper reflection on the social phenomenon of fame-infatuation. An intelligent read that will have you laughing and turning the pages more quickly every chapter. And a final reason why you should go out NOW and get this book, is because Hollywood is planning its very own version of it to come out October next year. I don’t know about you, but I always like to have read a book before I see the movie, especially when as many changes have been made to the storyline, as in the script of How to Lose Friends and Alienate People (read it on IMDB).
xx Steph
