Chore Whore: Adventures of a Celebrity Personal Assistant
I have been used, abused, lied to, and cheated on, blamed, shamed, screamed at, and ridiculed. I've been scammed and damned, had my ass kissed, my reputation dissed, and my face spat on. All in the name of working as a celebrity personal assistant . . . a
CHORE WHORE!
After twenty years of working thanklessly for a dozen high-powered Hollywood hotshots, Corki Brown has had enough. She's sick to death of handling elaborate extortion deals, washing groupies' dirty underwear, and having to whip up intimate dinners on no notice for spoiled stars, each with his or her own bizarre dietary demands. And now her ten-year-old son is starting to exhibit some disturbing signs of Tinseltown weirdness. It's time to get out, but escape won't be easy. . . .
Customer Review: Light and Easy Read...
Very cute book! Very easy read, won't take you more than an afternoon or a day (depending on quickly you read). If you are looking for something light and fun, this is the book for you!
Customer Review: Getting by with a little help
First of all this book IS a novel. The author did work as a 'personal assistant' in Hollywood, but for obvious reasons, the novel format is used because there would be law suits if real people were mentioned. Real people ARE mentioned: Jennifer Anniston, Meg Ryan, Angelica Houston etc, but only peripherally ie. seen at a restaurant, attended her client's dinner parties and so forth. Corky Brown, the main character and 'chore whore' of the title, is a 40 year old woman of colour with a son to support. She is trying to raise her son and do her work in a way commensurate with her own morality and beliefs. Naturally this is impossible to achieve when your clients are superwealthy, engaging in group sex and expect you to clean up their physical and emotional messes with discretion! At one stage her son catches her lying for one of her clients and takes her to task for it and the reader feels the dilemma that Corky is caught in.
I think she has been careful to cover the identities of her main clients, although real names are frequently dropped in relation to them. Is Tommy Ray Tommy Lee Jones?? Who knows. I read this book in a couple of hours and did enjoy it. It got me thinking AGAIN about the emotional and moral vacuum the super rich seem to inhabit and the legions of support people who are trying to cope on very minimum wages in a city like Los Angeles. It all works out for Corky in the end. She seems a genuinely good person, with great skills who has spent most of her life struggling on a minimum wage, her work mostly taken for granted or unappreciated. It was nice to see her vindicated. She applies for a job as Jennifer Anniston's main assistant in the book and makes the final cut, turning the job down at the last minute out of loyalty to her oldest client (who then turns on her in a most spectacular fashion). You wonder how things might have turned out if she'd taken a job with this actor who the author makes a point of telling the reader is known as a fair and good employer.
Women like Corky survive by reaching out to friends around them, supporting them and in turn being supported by them. Corky's friendships are the most uplifting part of this book. Friends and family, the ties that bind, are what makes a crucial difference to all of our lives especially when things go pearshaped. I think that this is what the reader takes away from this book, underneath the glitter that is Hollywood.
