End Credits: How I Broke Up with Hollywood

by Patty Lin

Overview

What happens when you land your dream job and everything you've been working toward becomes a complete nightmare? This is Patty Lin's story. She climbed the ladder as an award-winning television writer (often the only Asian person in the room) only to be confronted by discouragement, burnout, and toxicity.

“Why would you quit such a cool career?”

One minute Patty Lin was begging her way into the audience of Late Night with David Letterman. Just a few years later, through relentless hard work and sacrifice, she earned a seat in the writers’ rooms of the hottest TV shows of all time, where she was one of the few women–and the only Asian person. While writing for Friends, Freaks and Geeks, Desperate Housewives, and Breaking Bad, Lin steeled herself against the indignities of the cutthroat TV industry and its chaotic, sexist, crushing work culture. Realizing that the only script in life you can write is your own, she fearlessly walked away.

This funny, fresh, eye-opening, and inside-Hollywood story will resonate with anyone trying to find their way in the world—and will inspire countless dreamers to listen to their inner voices and know when it’s time to get out.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781958506066
Publisher:	Zibby Publishing
Publication date:	08/29/2023
Pages:	310
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.20(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Patty Lin is a former TV writer and producer. Her Breaking Bad episode, “Gray Matter,” was nominated for a Writers Guild Award for Outstanding Script in the Episodic Drama category. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband. 

Editorial Reviews

2023-07-05
A former TV writer recounts her years working in the business.

“Ever since I retired from television at the ripe age of thirty-eight,” writes the author, “people have asked me: ‘Why would you quit such a cool career?’ ” Lin, a former staff writer and producer for shows like Friends, Freaks and Geeks, and Desperate Housewives, shares her mostly negative experiences in “an unhealthy culture filled with damaged people who both perpetrated abuse and accepted it.” With a few exceptions, notably her stint on Freaks and Geeks, the author’s tenure as a TV writer was unsatisfying. “On my first day as a television writer,” she writes, “my boss used me to fuck over one of the other writers.” Years later, her outlook remained unchanged: “I’d been through some harrowing shit in my career,” but on a specific day during her time with Breaking Bad, “I hit a new low.” Lin acknowledges she was paid well while exposing the countless unsavory aspects of the entertainment industry. “We all became worker bees,” she notes, “writing disembodied scenes that would get stitched together into a Frankenstein of a script.” When she attained the level of producer, she had “to deal with problems I used to be sheltered from. And by problems, I mean actors.” The author effectively illuminates the loneliness she experienced as the only Asian writer in the room, “buckling under the pressure to represent my entire race,” as well as examples of “the culture that allows men to behave badly.” The weakest parts of the narrative focus on Lin’s long-term relationship, which ultimately failed, and include tepid revelations such as, “It takes two to tango.” A year after leaving the industry, she began this book “as a therapeutic exercise.” It’s clear the author’s writing process was cathartic, but her audience may be limited to fellow former TV writers and those interested in the behind-the-scenes goings-on of that world.

There’s nothing groundbreaking here, but the book is heartfelt and candid.

Kirkus Reviews

A hilarious and brutally honest memoir about life as a writer in Hollywood which could only be told by someone who escaped.”
—Judd Apatow, producer of Girls and Bridesmaids and director of 40-Year-Old Virgin

“I love Patty Lin. I think she’s one of the most talented writers I’ve ever met. And she’s also a great person. True, she does have a few food issues that made ordering lunch each day a bit of an ordeal, but she’s got a heart of gold. And we had a blast writing together.”
—Paul Feig, creator of Freaks and Geeks and director of Bridesmaids

“Patty Lin is one f*%king brave lady! What do you do when you find yourself at a bizarre crossroads? You have what everyone in the world wants, but it’s not what’s in your heart. It takes courage to trust yourself and walk away. I am deeply in love with Patty and her tough, funny Tinseltown tale. This book is more than just a showbiz memoir, it’s the story of a beautiful, creative soul getting back to who she really is.”
—Emily Spivey, writer for Saturday Night Live and Parks and Recreation

“With End Credits, Patty Lin has given us more than just a story about walking away from Hollywood to save her soul. This is also a critique of … the ways a first-generation Asian American woman must compromise herself for a laugh-track version of happiness and success in which at first the sky seems the limit, but turns out to be as limiting as the perimeters of a TV screen.”
—Gina Frangello, author of Blow Your House Down

“A wise, funny, whip-smart, and very moving book, End Credits takes us behind the scenes at some of the best-known TV shows of the last 25 years. You get the dirt, sure—but that’s only a part of what separates this memoir from the pack. Lin takes us on what is ultimately a brave journey to redemption and wholeness. A beautifully written book and a fascinating story. Lin’s debut shows brilliance and the promise of more. A stunner.”
—Rob Roberge, author of Liar: A Memoir

"Patty Lin contains multitudes. Her memoir, End Credits, is masterfully written and reminds us that the end of one chapter is the beginning of another."
—Karen Duffy, author of Wise Up

“End Credits is a compulsively readable tale that had me abandoning sleep to keep turning the pages. In addition to providing a totally riveting fly-on-the-wall perspective on the cutthroat television industry, it manages to be hilarious and heartfelt at the same time. A beautiful memoir—I loved every single moment.”
—Alisha Fernandez Miranda, author of My What If Year

“End Credits is a sharp, funny, and moving memoir that not only takes you behind-the-scenes of Hollywood, but also into the heart of a powerful, creative woman who keeps pushing past her limits. Patty Lin is a force of nature—I’m not sure there’s anything she can’t do—and her story will no doubt inspire readers everywhere.”
—Susie Luo, author of Paper Names

From the Publisher

06/10/2024

Television writer Lin's debut memoir breaks the fourth wall and places listeners directly in a show's writer's room, where scripts are created, dissected, and rewritten. Lin, who wrote for programs like Freaks and Geeks, Friends, Desperate Housewives, and Breaking Bad, tells how what was once a dream job became a waking nightmare. Lin consistently felt pressure to be the kind of professional that her Taiwanese mother could brag about to her friends. The world of TV was incomprehensible to her mother, and listeners may agree that the process of writing and producing a show is less glamorous than one might imagine. Lin reveals that the industry is brutal, and it doesn't help to be a woman, a person of color, or both. Lin narrates her own audiobook, making her voice heard as she describes navigating from show to show, meeting famous actors in real life, spending a wild weekend in the Dominican Republic on Sammy Sosa's estate, and, finally, leaving the business altogether. Television operates according to its own rules, and Lin focuses a spotlight on how it uses the talents of its writers without fairly compensating them or treating them with dignity or respect. VERDICT Listeners will love how Lin doesn't stick to the script in this engaging insider's look into the big business of the small screen.—Laura Trombley

Library Journal - Audio