Startup

by Doree Shafrir

Overview

From veteran online journalist and BuzzFeed writer Doree Shafrir comes a hilarious debut novel that proves there are some dilemmas that no app can solve.

Mack McAllister has a $600 million dollar idea. His mindfulness app, TakeOff, is already the hottest thing in tech and he's about to launch a new and improved version that promises to bring investors running and may turn his brainchild into a $1 billion dollar business -- in startup parlance, an elusive unicorn.

Katya Pasternack is hungry for a scoop that will drive traffic. An ambitious young journalist at a gossipy tech blog, Katya knows that she needs more than another PR friendly puff piece to make her the go-to byline for industry news.

Sabrina Choe Blum just wants to stay afloat. The exhausted mother of two and failed creative writer is trying to escape from her credit card debt and an inattentive husband-who also happens to be Katya's boss-as she rejoins a work force that has gotten younger, hipper, and much more computer literate since she's been away.

Before the ink on Mack's latest round of funding is dry, an errant text message hints that he may be working a bit too closely for comfort with a young social media manager in his office. When Mack's bad behavior collides with Katya's search for a salacious post, Sabrina gets caught in the middle as TakeOff goes viral for all the wrong reasons. As the fallout from Mack's scandal engulfs the lower Manhattan office building where all three work, it's up to Katya and Sabrina to write the story the men in their lives would prefer remain untold.

An assured, observant debut from the veteran online journalist Doree Shafrir, Startup is a sharp, hugely entertaining story of youth, ambition, love, money and technology's inability to hack human nature.

"A biting and astute debut novel [with] many delights."-Lara Vapnyar, New York Times Book Review

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780316360371
Publisher:	Little, Brown and Company
Publication date:	04/25/2017
Sold by:	Hachette Digital, Inc.
Format:	eBook
Sales rank:	570,212
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Doree Shafrir is a senior culture writer at BuzzFeed News and has written for New York Magazine, Slate, The Awl, Rolling Stone, Wired, and other publications. A former resident of Brooklyn, she now lives in Los Angeles with her husband Matt Mira, a comedy writer and podcaster, and their dog Beau.

What People are Saying About This

author of My Salinger Year - Joanna Rakoff

"Is there a satirist alive more brilliant—and more insightful—than Doree Shafrir? That I tore through Startup in a single day—ignoring the cries of my children and the dinging of my phone, laughing with recognition at her characters' foibles—is perhaps not nearly as significant as the fact that this ridiculously compelling novel has haunted me, every minute, in the weeks that followed. If you have ever lived in New York or worked in an office, you will love this novel. If you love the novels of Tom Perotta, you will love this novel. But also: If you are a sentient human, you will love this novel."

author of Siracusa - Delia Ephron

"A funny, delicious and charming novel about the alternate reality of startups #divine."

author of The Wangs vs. The World - Jade Chang

"Doree Shafrir is so spot-on in her observations about the tech world that it's hard not to think this novel must be telling the juicy truth—and in a way it is. Sharp, compelling, and expertly written."

author of Triburbia and The Subprimes - Karl Taro Greenfeld

"Doree Shafrir's Startup is like a thrilling combination of Po Bronson's Bombardiers and Jessica Knoll's Luckiest Girl Alive. Shafrir has set heartbreak and romance in the ticking clock environment of startups and the result is a topical, funny and perfectly observed document of our insane times."

Editorial Reviews

…a biting and astute debut novel…

The New York Times Book Review - Lara Vapnyar

02/20/2017
In her debut, BuzzFeed culture writer Shafrir skewers a world she knows well—startup culture and the outlets assigned to cover it. The story, told from three alternating perspectives, focuses on two companies renting space in a Manhattan office building. TakeOff, a mindfulness app, is on the verge of revolutionizing the world—or of failing miserably, depending on whether founder Mack McAllister can secure the next round of funding. Elsewhere in the building, ambitious millennial journalist Katya Pasternack has been given a mandate by her employer, the blog TechScene, to report real tech news, not just regurgitate influencers’ tweets. Caught in the middle is Katya’s boss’s wife Sabrina, a newly hired (and, at 36, downright old) social media “ninja” at TakeOff. When a potential sexual harassment scandal threatens to make Katya’s career and break Mack’s chances at a billion-dollar valuation, the ensuing commotion reveals not only personal conflicts but also the not-so-hidden hypocrisies at the heart of the tech boom. Shafrir’s satirical observations, about such topics as the nonstop snacking in startup offices, are often astute; unfortunately, they’re also often made multiple times. Also, in a novel that seems in part intended to highlight sexism in the tech industry, the object of the sexual harassment incident remains largely voiceless. Nevertheless, this is an enjoyable send-up that, unlike so many of the characters it portrays, doesn’t take itself too seriously. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly

"Startup is a clever novel about trying to connect in the tech-heavy world we live in now."—Brenda Janowitz, PopSugar

"Giddy fun...satirical genius."
—Marion Winik, Newsday

"Startup is compulsively readable. You will probably finish it in a day, because you will never find a reason to put it down."
—Alex Balk, The Awl

"Fast-paced and engaging...Shafrir's touch is just right in this debut novel. She's got the excesses of this industry nailed."—Shawna Seed, The Dallas Morning News

"Smart, amusing... a coming-of-age novel for these digital times.... Doree Shafrir manages to hold our interest for more than 140 characters as she pokes fun at a group of young overachievers in this old-school written form."—Clea Simon, The Boston Globe

"If you love smart, true-to-life novels and are fascinated by the startup world, this is the book for you."—Bookish

"A searing yet hilarious novel, Doree Shafrir, senior culture writer at Buzzfeed, hands readers a promising-and a promise-fulfilling-debut."
—Ilana Masad, Read It Forward

"Startup's greatest accomplishment is the care and sensitivity with which it adapts app-based communication for a more traditionally novelistic format...As the world hurtles ever onward at a breakneck clip, Startup illustrates the dystopian quality of our destabilizing present by generating nostalgia for it. "—Helen Holmes, Rolling Stone

"Shafrir smartly - but lovingly - skewers tech culture, its grandiose leaders and the naivety of thinking that good intentions, lots of money and a mindset of fun will prevent bad behaviors in the workplace."—Matt Tiffany, Portland Press Herald

"Eerily on-point in its illustration of this universe-especially when it comes to gender dynamics."—Hope Reese, Hazlitt

"Shafrir presents a humorous and thoughtful meditation about both the sexism in tech, and its counterpoint, as one character describes it: today's 'very male-hostile moment.' More than anything, the book will leave you wishing there were more like it."
—Anne VanderMey, Fortune

"Startup may have read as satire a decade ago but feels like historical record today. Shafrir's precise eye for detail takes stock of the tech industry's favorite answers for tough questions ... Startup is about more than business. It navigates the rocky foundation of relationships, journalism's importance, sexual harassment, and digital careerism."—Andy Newman, The Millions

"Doree Shafrir, senior culture writer at Buzzfeed, has written a novel of manners for the digital age. Startup could be called Pride and Prejudice and Tech Bros; Shafrir turns a sharp eye on the culture of techy startups and their unspoken moral codes."—Heather Scott Partington, Las Vegas Weekly

"Takes jabs at the pretentiousness that's all too common among the young and brash tech workforce."
—Michael B. Farrell, Christian Science Monitor

"The book aptly skewers the trappings of the tech industry, but also gets to the heart of one of its most a persistent and pernicious issues—its treatment of women."—Nina Zipkin, Entrepreneur Magazine

"Highly entertaining... this is my pick for your beach bag."
—Lexi Mainland, A Cup of Jo, Seven Big Summer Books

"A satire about the New York tech scene that pulls no punches when it comes to inconsistencies between the rhetoric around humane, supportive office culture and many workers' realities."
—Evie Nagy, The Official Slack Blog

"A pointed illustration of the tech world's cults of personality, the outsized egos that believe something like a mindfulness app could change the world, and the seedy underbelly of all that workplace closeness: sexual harassment."—Angela Shah, Xconomy

"In an industry ripe for satire and criticism, Shafrir tweaks the startup culture beautifully while introducing characters you will actually care about."
—James McQuiston, NeuFutur

"Our favorite BuzzFeed editor brings her storytelling prowess to the next level in this dazzling debut about the adventures (and misadventures) of one startup... Startup belongs on your summer TRL."
—Brit + Co.

"Close out of Twitter and start turning the pages of this novel by a Buzzfeed writer who gives us a glimpse into Flatiron-based startup culture."—Melissa Kravitz, amNY, Summer Beach Reads

"This entertaining story is about youth, ambition, love, money and of course the startup world."
—Allanah Dykes, Levo

From the Publisher

★ 2017-02-02
Veteran journalist Shafrir, currently of BuzzFeed News, sharply skewers tech culture in a feminist satire that's as addictive as it is biting.At 28, Mack McAllister, golden boy of Silicon Alley, is the founder of TakeOff, a workplace-wellness app (tell it how you're feeling and it makes you feel better!) valued at $600 million (a billion, hopefully, not this funding round, maybe, but next). Katya Pasternack is an ambitious young reporter at TechScene ("Tech news straight, no chaser") who knows that while she's a master of raking in the traffic—her posts top the charts—she needs a game-changing scoop to prove her chops and, more urgently, keep her job amid an ominous companywide "audit." Meanwhile, Katya's boss, Dan Blum, downright wizened at 39, is unhappily married to Sabrina Choe Blum, a failed novelist and exhausted mother of two in serious credit-card debt. And as it happens, Sabrina has recently (and somewhat desperately) taken an ill-fitting social media job at—where else?—TakeOff. Then one fateful night, Mack, who has been getting rather friendly with Sabrina's young, pretty boss, fires off a series of unfortunate texts—texts that, by virtue of the incestuous New York tech scene, aren't so private after all. And so the game is in play: Mack's in trouble; Katya's hungry for a story; and Sabrina, involuntarily entangled on both sides, ends up in the eye of the brewing storm. Increasingly fed up with the near-endless entitlement of the men in their lives, Katya and Sabrina—unlikely allies—find themselves working toward a shared goal: to expose the tech-bro patriarchy for what it is. Exacting, though not without empathy—Shafrir renders even the most infuriating of her characters with unexpected humanity—the novel is a page-turning pleasure that packs a punch. To call it expertly observed is an understatement.

Kirkus Reviews