Frenzied corporate machinations abound in this frothy re-creation of the early days of the home shopping industry.
An aimless high school dropout challenges himself with a brand-new career path in Cairo’s novel.
It’s 1987, and Oklahoma City–based TV network TeleShop USA, anchored by a dynamic cast of seasoned presenters, has become a popular destination for shop-at-home customers. Hoping to leave behind his restless, vagabond, “unstructured” lifestyle, Robert MacKenzie, 25, waits in the wings to unknowingly seize the opportunity of a lifetime. MacKenzie desperately needs a job, and, despite having zero qualifications or experience in television production (and using falsified references), he interviews with company brass, shams his way through some practice pitches, and is providentially given the chance to prove himself at TeleShop. From this point, the narrative masterfully marches out a series of cleverly depicted program hosts, management personnel, and TeleShop employees. Chief among them is Dave Leonard, 43, better known as “the Dealmaker,” the network’s top salesman and TV’s unmatched “King of Bargains.” Yet fame has taken its toll, and Leonard has devolved into a snarky, heavy-drinking, unfaithful egomaniac recently dumped by his wife and estranged from his two daughters, living for months in a squalid roadside motel. As New York investors Triboro Media Group begin buying their way toward becoming majority stockholders and decision-makers at the network, management begins to nervously shift their projections and decisions accordingly. The novel works its charms through a series of dubious coincidences, as when MacKenzie takes a room in the same motel as Leonard and makes the most of their spontaneous orientation session, in which the new hire gets the lowdown on the company’s inner workings. As MacKenzie is drawn in deeper into the company’s fold as one of the newest “rare natural hosts,” things begin to fall apart, egos get bruised, rivalries simmer, and alliances form. Along the way, other ambitious and cleverly drawn peripheral characters spark to life within the TeleShop world, including the lonely, impulsive Yasmine Dubai, Director of Talent, who finds herself attracted to MacKenzie; lusty, unhinged assistant corporate counsel Sandiya King, who deceptively vies for Robert’s attentions; cutthroat network president Billy-Ray Newton; and Dixie Carter, aka “the Dragon Lady,” TeleShop’s other intimidating, high-revenue-generating core host, whose specialty is jewelry.
Though much of the plot contrivances are implausible and included for the sake of narrative thrills, the details about the machinations of the home shopping industry feel authentic and impressively well researched. Cairo taps into a niche market rarely explored in fiction and immerses his characters in the high-stress, micromanaged nuances of successful on-air sales and the “steam cooker” atmosphere of televised commerce. (“‘For revenue calculation, we then examine each minute as a series of six, ten-second episodes.’ ‘Doesn’t that ever get the place feeling like an emergency room?’ ‘Exactly.’”) In addition to its sudsy melodramatic office dynamics, Cairo’s book entertainingly taps into the beginnings of a market that would explode in popularity and profitability on multiple media platforms in the ensuing decades. Readers will cheer on MacKenzie as the formerly underachieving underdog tries to right his path and make the best of his life and career.
Frenzied corporate machinations abound in this frothy re-creation of the early days of the home shopping industry.Pub Date: Dec. 6, 2023
ISBN: 9798986395661
Page Count: 355
Publisher: Richards & Jones
Review Posted Online: Jan. 18, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
An affecting portrait of a prickly woman.
A lifetime’s worth of letters combine to portray a singular character.
Sybil Van Antwerp, a cantankerous but exceedingly well-mannered septuagenarian, is the titular correspondent in Evans’ debut novel. Sybil has retired from a beloved job as chief clerk to a judge with whom she had previously been in private legal practice. She is the divorced mother of two living adult children and one who died when he was 8. She is a reader of novels, a gardener, and a keen observer of human nature. But the most distinguishing thing about Sybil is her lifelong practice of letter writing. As advancing vision problems threaten Sybil’s carefully constructed way of life—in which letters take the place of personal contact and engagement—she must reckon with unaddressed issues from her past that threaten the house of cards (letters, really) she has built around herself. Sybil’s relationships are gradually revealed in the series of letters sent to and received from, among others, her brother, sister-in-law, children, former work associates, and, intriguingly, literary icons including Joan Didion and Larry McMurtry. Perhaps most affecting is the series of missives Sybil writes but never mails to a shadowy figure from her past. Thoughtful musings on the value and immortal quality of letters and the written word populate one of Sybil’s notes to a young correspondent while other messages are laugh-out-loud funny, tinged with her characteristic blunt tartness. Evans has created a brusque and quirky yet endearing main character with no shortage of opinions and advice for others but who fails to excavate the knotty difficulties of her own life. As Sybil grows into a delayed self-awareness, her letters serve as a chronicle of fitful growth.
An affecting portrait of a prickly woman.Pub Date: May 6, 2025
ISBN: 9780593798430
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Feb. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
A pleasant if not entirely convincing tribute to the power of art.
A French art historian’s English-language fiction debut combines the story of a loving relationship between a grandfather and granddaughter with an enlightening discussion of art.
One day, when 10-year-old Mona removes the necklace given to her by her now-dead grandmother, she experiences a frightening, hour-long bout of blindness. Her parents take her to the doctor, who gives her a variety of tests and also advises that she see a psychiatrist. Her grandfather Henry tells her parents that he will take care of that assignment, but instead, he takes Mona on weekly visits to either the Louvre, the Musée d’Orsay, or the Centre Pompidou, where each week they study a single work of art, gazing at it deeply and then discussing its impact and history and the biography of its maker. For the reader’s benefit, Schlesser also describes each of the works in scrupulous detail. As the year goes on, Mona faces the usual challenges of elementary school life and the experiences of being an only child, and slowly begins to understand the causes of her temporary blindness. Primarily an amble through a few dozen of Schlesser’s favorite works of art—some well known and others less so, from Botticelli and da Vinci through Basquiat and Bourgeois—the novel would probably benefit from being read at a leisurely pace. While the dialogue between Henry and the preternaturally patient and precocious Mona sometimes strains credulity, readers who don’t have easy access to the museums of Paris may enjoy this vicarious trip in the company of a guide who focuses equally on that which can be seen and the context that can’t be. Come for the novel, stay for the introductory art history course.
A pleasant if not entirely convincing tribute to the power of art.Pub Date: Aug. 26, 2025
ISBN: 9798889661115
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Europa Editions
Review Posted Online: June 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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