CONFESSIONS OF A SOCIOPATHIC SOCIAL CLIMBER

A first novel from Britisher Lang (How to Spot a Bastard by His Star Sign, 2002) offers up some sharp and funny moments, but with bad behavior its only joke, it quickly becomes exceedingly thin stuff.

A self-absorbed, 30ish copywriter with an off-the-charts sense of herself, Katya Livingston smokes in the elevator because it’s banned in the office, uses her Save-the-Children orphan as her personal porter, and for entertainment tempts the fiancés of friends. The story consists of Katya’s journal entries, published in her own newspaper column, a writing job that she finessed behind the back of Teddington, a friend who hoped to secure it for himself. Along with Eliza, a New Age colleague; Ferguson, a failed gay male escort; and a few others, Teddington is among the friends Katya constantly uses, abuses, and then humiliates in her column, attributing any resentments to jealousy. Novelistic concerns like plot and character don’t apply in what is really just a string of farcical sketches that play off the Bridget Jones style. As such, it indeed has its moments, as when we find Katya, “manhunting” by setting a tripwire in Hyde Park, “After collecting only two old ladies and a poodle, get disheartened and go home again.” In addition to the failures and embarrassments of her (barely) one-dimensional friends and colleagues, Katya’s column chronicles her adventures looking for free drinks, higher-paying work, and a man up to her standards (she never finds one, tossing candidates aside like candy wrappers), writing for a TV series, house-sitting for a rich friend (“accidentally” losing her prize dog because he’s a bother), fabricating a libelous book about a semi-famous ex-lover’s shortcomings, then becoming the subject of a similar book by Teddington—and finally heading off to Hollywood to become a (pornographic) movie star.

There are some real laughs here, and the complete lack of redeeming value is refreshing. But the entirety is another demonstration that less is more. Take in small doses.