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THE MANNY by Holly Peterson
On Sale: June 19th
Hardcover
368 pages
ISBN-10: 0385340400
ISBN-13: 9780385340403
What’s a Park Avenue working mom to
do when her troubled son desperately needs a male role model and her
husband is a power workaholic? If she’s like the gutsy heroine of
Holly Peterson’s astute new comedy of manners among the ill-mannered
elite, she does what every other woman on the block does. She hires
herself a “manny.”
A solid middle-class girl from Middle America, Jamie Whitfield isn’t
“one of them” but she lives in “the Grid,” the wealthiest acre
of real estate in Manhattan, where big money and big media collide.
And she has most everything they have --- a big new apartment, full-time
help with her three children, as well as her very own detached Master
of the Universe attorney husband. What she doesn’t have, however,
is a full-time father figure for their struggling nine-year-old son,
Dylan. But the rich haven’t yet encountered a problem they can’t
hire someone else to solve.
Enter the manny.
At first the idea of paying a man to provide a role model for Dylan
sounds too crazy to be true. But one look at Peter Bailey is enough
to convince Jamie that the idea may not be quite so insane after all.
Peter is calm, cool, competent, and so charmingly down-to-earth, he’s
irresistible. And with the political sex scandal of the decade propelling
her career as a news producer into overdrive, and her increasingly erratic
husband locked in his study with suspicious files, Jamie is in serious
need of some grounding.
Peter reminds her of everything she once was, still misses, and underneath
all the high-society glitz, still is. But will the new manny in her
life put the ground back beneath her feet, or sweep her off them?
"Holly Peterson has
a keen observer's eye for the frailties, foibles, and frivolities of
present day upper class life among the rich of New York City. She understands
her territory well and writes with authority."
Dominick Dunne, author of A SEASON IN PURGATORY
"Brisk, crisp, knowing and fun."
Christopher Buckley, author
of THANK YOU FOR SMOKING
"Holly Peterson writes about the rich with acute understanding and
a drop-dead eye for detail. The funniest, sexiest ride in the limo lane
since THE BONFIRE OF THE VANITIES."
Tina Brown, author of THE DIANA
CHRONICLES.
"Money, Manners, Mannys: Holly Peterson's debut is a fabulously
sharp skewering of the silly-rich in New York. Observing a Park Avenue
Working Mom falling for The Help had me both touched and tormented with
laughter. I couldn't put it down. We should ALL get a Manny right now."
Plum
Sykes, author of BERGDORF BLONDES
"I leapt on THE MANNY and devoured it in one sitting. It's a riveting
portrait of millionaires' life on 'The Grid', full of eye-watering details.
And it made me instantly want to hire a male nanny...... for me!"
Sophie
Kinsella, author of SHOPAHOLIC & BABY
"Holly Peterson takes us on a locomotive tour through the living rooms
of the Upper East Side and the newsrooms of the media elite. The trip
is sexy, hilarious, and heart-wrenching."
Candace Bushnell, author
of SEX AND THE CITY
Holly Peterson spent a decade as an Emmy®
award-winning producer at ABC news. Her work has been published in the
New York Times, Harper’s Bazaar, Talk, and Newsweek,
where she is now a contributing editor. She lives in New York City with
her family and is working on her next novel.
This summer’s "most hyped must-have" beach read is THE MANNY, a debut novel by former ABC News producer Holly Peterson. It’s a cross between THE NANNY DIARIES and THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA, with plenty of fashion worries, lively sex and shallow socializing. Underneath the light plot is a more sober running commentary about the superficial lives of the richer-than-rich, the inability of money to solve relationship problems and mid-life musings on what’s most important.
As the story begins, 36-year-old Jamie Whitfield has her hands full as the mother of three lively children: two-year-old Michael, five-year-old Gracie and nine-year-old Dylan. Add to this a demanding job as a news producer and a narcissist husband, and Jamie is at a breaking point. The formerly middle-class, Midwestern woman struggles with her Upper East Side life and a raised-on-Park-Avenue attorney husband who can’t quite make ends meet on a million-plus-dollar income each year. Just when she thinks her plate is full enough, Dylan begins showing signs of withdrawal from the world and is anxious to the point of being immobilized at times. She knows he needs help from a male role model.
When she meets the hunky Peter Bailey, a young software entrepreneur who seems good with children, Jamie thinks she has found someone who will make up for Phillip’s lack in the fatherhood department. She hires him as a “manny” to help bring Dylan out of his introverted shell. What she’s not taking into the equation is her own frustrations over Phillip and how easily Peter seems to fill in the gaps in her disappointing married life.
The middle-aged mom fantasy element is in full play here. Peter isn’t just any young Turk off the streets of New York City. He is kind, intelligent, loves children, and is hot, hot, hot. Most of all, he admires and appreciates Jamie, just when her snobby husband Phillip ignores her or criticizes her as not good enough for his social set at every turn of the page.
Jamie buries herself in her work, but when her big news report on a conservative congressman’s affair goes awry, not only her marriage but her job is in jeopardy. And affairs aren’t just a part of her work life. Will Peter be the one to put all the pieces back together again? Or can Jamie shore up her already precarious marriage? (And can anyone really stay in love for long with a husband whose computer password is B-E-A-V-E-R?)
Laudably, Peterson doesn’t make the cheating, dirty-dealing, self-absorbed Phillip all bad. Throughout the book, readers will see flashes of the nice guy that attracted Jamie way back when their marriage was vibrant and happy. Peter seems a little too good to be true, and a few character flaws might have made him a more believable character. Since this is not literary fiction --- just light, fun reading --- it doesn’t matter.
The theme that will resonate with readers is that old fictional tried-and-true cliché: love with the right person is the only real happiness. No amount of money, mannies, the right schools, the right job, the right clothes or the right socializing makes Jamie happy, but ultimately she does seem to discover a soul mate. (You’ll have to read the book to discover if it’s Phillip or Peter; we won’t give away the ending.) It is also a cautionary tale about how marriages and families get into trouble, and what happens when other priorities take first place (such as a high-paying powerful career, or a hunger for being seen in all the right places with all the right people).
Although originality is not THE MANNY’s strong point, many exhausted working moms will find it an entertaining escape.
--- Reviewed by Cindy Crosby. Contact Cindy at phrelanzer@aol.com.fea
 Click here now to buy this book from Amazon.com.
June 22, 2007
Holly Peterson's debut novel, THE MANNY, gives readers an inside peek into the lives of Manhattan's elite, including the new trend of hiring "mannies" to care for their children. In this Q&A, Peterson describes the very real circumstances that inspired her to write this fictional story and shares her opinion on why the seemingly unconventional idea of male caregivers is rising in popularity among families of all economic backgrounds. She also explains how she is able to juggle her career in magazines with writing novels and spending time with her husband and children, and offers advice to other harried mothers on how to balance work and family life.
Question: After a career in news and magazines, why did you decide to write a book?
Holly Peterson: These days, people do the craziest things and come up with the most ridiculously funny comments and I have been secretly taking notes for years. When I realized I had notebooks filled with juicy material, I started my book. This book is written from a very factual, journalistic point of view, and though the plots may be fiction, the super upper-class background and basis for all the characters are very real. I think the reader will understand that from the get go --- even though the situations in the book may seem like they come from another planet, they come off as very believable.
Q: The book is set in "the Grid," where you grew up. Yet your heroine is an outsider. Did you make that decision to make her more sympathetic?
HP: Obviously people relate more to an outsider desperately trying to fit in than they do to an insider who has it all and glides through life. Jamie Whitfield shares so many familiar struggles of American women: she tries to be the best mom she can be despite her heavy work load, she feels guilty about her time away, she appeases her husband constantly just to make things smoother, she makes mistakes, and because this is romantic fiction, she finds a sexy manny --- a nanny of the male persuasion --- who sweeps her off her feet and takes her away from it all...not because he is simply smoking hot, but because he is a layered, funny, complex, brilliant guy who understands her better than her husband. Smart and funny and knowing is far more sexy than just plain handsome and hot, don't you think?
Q: Is having a "manny" really a trend in the social circles you describe? If so, was this trend what spurred you to write THE MANNY?
HP: Many women in my neck of the woods hire mannies alongside their other staff members: cooks, nannies, housekeepers, drivers. Though as I have researched the phenomenon, I have found that mannies are becoming more common in all income groups. People are finding that kids love playing with rough-and-tumble guys and that men are terrific caregivers.
Q: Would you consider getting a manny for your children?
HP: Last summer, I watched my kids with their male camp counselor and saw the gleam in their eyes. I tentatively asked him if he had a winter job, and when he said no, I hired him on the spot. He messes up the house, puts his dirty shoes on the sofa, and forgets to tell me everything, but my kids adore him. So he's worth it...most of the time!
Q: Are you as stressed and overbooked as your heroine in THE MANNY, or do you set aside time to be with the family? Do you have any tips for today's harried working woman about juggling all of life's duties?
HP: Like all working women (or stay-at-home moms!) of course I am harried all the time. I work three days at Newsweek magazine and try to write my books in the library on my days off. I have enough flexibility with both book and magazine writing that I can pick up my kids 2 days a week after school.
Of course I am getting phone calls from the State Department when I am trying to drive a Suburban full of screaming kids to ice-skating --- every Mom has a version of that --- but it's still worth it to physically be with them even if phone calls pull me away. One piece of advice that really really works for my family: special time. Every week, each of my three kids gets some special time with me. They feel comforted all week knowing they are getting some time with me alone. I highly recommend it, and remember you have to leave the house during special time or the other kids will barge in!
Q: Do you plan on writing more books? If so, are you working on the next one now?
HP: I plan to write many books in the future. I love to write about people who love someone they don't think they can ever have. Nothing in life is more painful. Whenever I think about Iraq or global conflicts, I always wonder about the lost loves. Shiites who are cordoned off from Sunnis and can't contact them, wives or girlfriends who've lost their true loves to a car bomb, women who can't be with the man they love because of a strict society. I think that tragic love is the one human condition that binds us all. I hope to write about impossible love stories that end up on a happy note.
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Chapter One
Wheels Up!
If you want to see rich people act really rich, go to St. Henry's School for Boys at three p.m. on any weekday. Nothing makes rich people crazier than being around other rich people who might be richer than they are. Private school drop-off and pickup really gets them going. It's an opportunity to stake their claim, show their wares, and let the other parents know where they rank in the top .001 percent of the top .0001 percent.
A cavalcade of black SUVs, minivans, and chauffeured cars snaked its way up the block beside me as I ran to my son's after-school game. I'd skipped another meeting at work, but nothing was going to keep me that day. Gingko trees and limestone mansions lined the street where a crowd gathered in front of the school. I steeled myself and waded into a sea of parents: the dads in banker suits barking into their phones, the moms with their glamorous sunglasses and toned upper arms --- many with dressed-up little darlings by their sides. These children play an important role in their parents' never-ending game of one-upmanship as they are trotted out in smocked dresses, shuttled from French tutor to cello class, and discussed like prize livestock at a 4-H fair.
Idling in front of the school, with his tinted rear window half open, a cosmetics giant read about himself in the gossip columns. By his side, his four-year-old little girl watched a Barbie Fairytopia DVD on the small screen that dropped down from the ceiling of the vehicle while he finished the article. The nanny, in a starched white uniform, waited patiently in the front seat for him to inform her it was time to go inside and pick up his son.
A few yards down the block, a three-and-a-half-inch green lizard heel was reaching for the sidewalk from the back of a fat silver Mercedes S600. The chauffeur flashed its yellow headlights at me. Next I saw a brown tweed skirt jacked up on a shapely thigh, ultimately revealing a thirty-something woman shaking out her honey-colored hair while her driver sprinted like a madman to get her arm.
"Jamie! Jamie!" called Ingrid Harris, waving her manicured hand. Dozens of chunky gold bangles jangled as they slid down her arm.
I tried to shield my eyes from the glare. "Ingrid. Please. I love you, but no. I've got to get to Dylan's game."
"I've been trying to reach you!"
I ducked into the crowd, knowing she would come after me.
"Jamie! Please! Wait!" Ingrid caught up to me, leaving her driver behind to contend with her two boys wailing in their car seats. She let out a huge breath as if the fifteen-foot walk from the Mercedes had taxed her. "Hooo!" Remember, this is a crowd that touches down on actual pavement as seldom as possible. "Thank God you were home last night."
"No problem. Anytime."
"Henry is so in debt to you," said Ingrid.
The burly chauffeur carried each of her younger boys in one graceful arc from their car seats to the curb, as if he were placing eggs in a basket.
"The four Ambien. Henry was going hunting with some clients for five days, it was wheels-up at ten p.m. to Argentina, and he was crazed!"
"Jamie." Next, a voice I loved. My friend Kathryn Fitzgerald. She commuted from Tribeca and she was wearing jeans and French sneakers. Like me, she wasn't one of those people who grew up on the Upper East Side and never touched a doorknob in their entire life. "Hurry. Let's plow up front."
As we started up the marble stairs, a white Cadillac Escalade pulled up to the curb. You could tell a hundred feet away that there were children of a major CEO inside. It came to a stop and the aristocratic driver, wearing a bowler hat like Oddjob, got out and walked around to open the door, and the four McAllister kids piled out of their SUV with four Philippina nannies---each holding a child's hand.
All four of the nannies were wearing white pants, white rubber-soled shoes, and matching Dora the Explorer nurse's shirts with little Band-Aids all over them. There were so many little children and nurses in their tight little pack that they looked like a centipede making its way up the steps.
At five minutes after three, the school opened and the parents politely but forcefully pushed each other to get in. Up four flights of stairs to the gym, I could hear echoes of young male voices and the screech of sneakers. St. Henry's fourth-grade team was already out practicing in their royal-blue and white uniforms. I quickly scanned the court for my Dylan, but didn't see him. The moms and dads from Dylan's school were beginning to gather on one side of the bleachers. Scattered among them were the team's siblings with their nannies, representing almost every country in the United Nations. No Dylan. I finally spotted him huddled on a bench near the locker room door. He was still dressed in his khakis and white button-down shirt with the collar undone. His blue blazer was draped on the bench beside him. When he saw me, he squinted and looked away. My husband, Phillip, summoned the exact same expression when he was angry and feeling put upon.
"Dylan! I'm here!"
"You're late, Mom."
"Sweetheart, I'm not late."
"Well, some of the moms got here before you."
"You know what? There's a line outside, four moms deep, and I can't cut the line. There's a lot of moms still coming up behind me."
"Whatever." He looked away.
"Honey. Where's your uniform?"
"In my backpack."
I could feel the waves of stubborn tension emanating from my son. I sat down next to him. "It's time to put it on."
"I don't want to wear my uniform."
Coach Robertson came over. "You know what?" He put his arms in the air, signaling his exasperation. "I'm not gonna force him into it every time. I told him he would miss the game, but I can't make him put the uniform on. If you wanna know the reality of the situation here, he's being ridiculous . . ."
"It's really not being ridiculous. Okay?" This guy was never in tune with Dylan. I brought the coach to the side. "We've all discussed this --- Dylan's unease before a game. He's nine years old. It's his first year on a team." The coach didn't seem to be moved, and he took off. Then I put my arm around Dylan. "Honey. Coach Robertson isn't my favorite person, but he's right. It's time to put on the uniform."
"He's doesn't even like me."
"He likes all the boys the same, and even if he's tough, he just wants you to play."
"Well, I'm not gonna."
"Even for me?"
Dylan shook his head. He had big brown eyes and strong features, with thick dark hair that never fell just right. Dylan's mouth smiled more than his eyes ever did.
"Dylan! Hurry!" Douglas Wood, an obnoxious little kid with freckles, a crew cut, and a pudgy bottom, waddled over. "What's wrong with you, Dylan?"
"Nothing."
"Well, then how come you're not playing?"
"I am playing."
"Well, how come you don't have your uniform on?"
"Because my mom had to talk to me. It's her fault."
Coach Robertson, angry with Douglas for leaving the warm-up and with my son for his refusal to play at all, marched toward us, pumping his elbows. "Come on, kid. Time's up. Let's go." He picked up Dylan's backpack and pulled him by his hand toward the locker room. Dylan rolled his eyes back at me and lumbered along, dragging his uniform behind him on the floor. I headed for the bleachers with an ache in my heart.
Kathryn, who'd gone ahead to save me a seat in the bleachers, was now waving to me from the fifth row on the St. Henry's side. She had twin boys in Dylan's grade, as well as a daughter at our nursery school. Her twins, Louis and Nicky, were fighting over a ball, and Coach Robertson leaned down to whistle loudly into their ears to break it up. I watched Kathryn stand up to get a better look at their arguing, her long blond ponytail cascading down the back of her worn suede jacket. As I edged by twenty people to slip in next to her, she sat down and squeezed my knee.
"We made it just in time," she said, smiling.
"Tell me about it." I placed my tired head in the palms of my hands.
A few seconds later, the Wilmington Boys' School team burst through the gym doors like an invading army. I watched my tentative son hang back beside the other players. His sweaty teammates ran back and forth, all in their last fleeting years of boyhood before the gawky ravages of adolescence took hold. They rarely threw the ball to Dylan, mostly because he never made eye contact and always jogged along the periphery of the team, safe outside any commotion. His lanky build and knobby knees made his movements less than graceful, like a giraffe making short stops.
"Dylan's not playing well."
Kathryn looked at me. "None of them play well. Look at them; they can barely get the ball up into the hoop. They're not strong enough yet."
"Yeah, I guess. But he's down."
"Not always down. It's just sometimes," Kathryn answered.
Barbara Fisher turned around from the row in front of me. She was wearing tight jeans, a starched white blouse with the collar turned up against gravity, and an expensive-looking fuchsia cable-knit sweater. She was too tan and as thin as a Giacometti statue.
"Ohhh, here's the busy-bee-worky-worky-mom at a game."
I jerked back. "It means a lot to me to see my son." I looked over her head toward the boys.
Barbara moved over five inches to block my view and make another point. "We were talking at the school benefit meeting about how hard it must be for you, never being able to get involved in Dylan's activities."
She was so annoying.
"I like to work. But if you choose not to work outside the home, I can certainly understand. It's probably a more enjoyable lifestyle."
"You're not doing it for the money. Obviously. Phillip's such a heavy-hitter lawyer these days." She was whispering (she thought), but everyone around us could hear her. "I mean, you can't possibly be contributing much financially on a scale that matters."
I rolled my eyes at Kathryn. "I actually make a pretty good salary, Barbara. But, no, I'm not really working for the money. It's just something I like to do. Call it a competitive streak. And right now I need to concentrate on Dylan's game because he can be competitive too, and I'm sure he'd like me to watch him play."
"You do that."
Kathryn pinched my arm too hard because she hated Barbara more than I did. I jumped at the pain and smacked her on the shoulder.
She whispered into my ear, "Amazing Barbara didn't find a way to bring up the new plane. In case you missed the billboard, Aaron's Falcon 2000 jet finally got delivered this weekend."
"I'm sure I'll hear about it soon," I answered, staring out at the court. Dylan was now attempting to block a shot, but the player ran right around him toward the basket and scored. The whistle blew. Warm-up over. All the kids retreated to their sides in a huddle.
"You know what's so obnoxious?" Kathryn whispered to me.
"So many things."
"They can't just say, 'We're leaving at three for the weekend,' which would actually mean they are leaving at three in the afternoon by car or train or some commercial flight or whatever." She leaned in closer to me. "No, they want you to know one thing: they're flying private. So suddenly they start talking like their pilots --- 'Oh, we're leaving for the weekend, and it's wheels-up at three p.m.'" She shook her head and grinned. "Like I give a shit what they're doing in the first place."
When I first married into this crowd, coming from middle-class, Middle American roots, these Manhattan Upper East Side families naturally intimidated me. My parents, always donning sensible Mephistos on their feet and fanny packs around their waists, reminded me all too often that I should keep a distance from the people in this newfound neighborhood---that back home in Minneapolis, it was easier to be haaaapy. Though I've tried to adjust for the sake of my husband, I'll never get used to people throwing out their pilot's name in conversation as if he were the cleaning lady. "I thought we'd take a jaunt to the Cape for a dinner, so I asked Richard to please be ready at three."
Dylan was on the bench with about ten other teammates as Coach Robertson threw the ball in the air for the jump ball. Thankfully, Dylan was excited by the game. He was talking to the kid next to him and pointing to the court. I relaxed a bit and let out a breath.
Two minutes later, a sippy cup ricocheted off my shoulder and landed in Kathryn's lap. We both looked behind us. "So sorry!" said a heavily accented Philippina nurse. The McAllister centipede was trying to maneuver into a row of bleachers behind me. Two of the younger children were braying like donkeys. This was the kind of thing that really got Kathryn going. She was no stranger to poor behavior from her own children, but she couldn't stomach the lack of respect the bratty Park Avenue kids spewed at their nannies.
She looked at them and turned to me. "Those poor women. What they must put up with. I'm going to do it. Right now. I'm going to ask them if there is a set schedule for matching uniforms and see what they say. You know, like Sponge Bob on Mondays, Dora on Tuesdays."
"Stop. Kathryn. Please. Who cares?"
"Hello? Like you, the obsessive list keeper, wouldn't want to know?" Kathryn smiled. "Next time you're at Sherrie's house for a birthday party, sneak into the kitchen and go to the desk next to the phone. There's a bound color-coded house manual that she had Roger's secretary type up. Instructions for everything --- I mean every single thing you could imagine."
"Like what?"
"I thought you weren't interested."
"Okay, maybe I am a little."
"Timetables for the overlapping staff: first shift, six a.m. to two p.m., second, nine to five, and third, four to midnight. Schedules for the pets, for the dogs' walkers and groomers. Directives on which of the children's clothes should be folded or hung. How to organize their mittens and scarves for fall, for winter dress, for winter sports. Where to hang all the princess costumes in the walk-in cedar closet once they're ironed --- yes, you heard me --- after they are ironed. Which china for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and season: seashells for summer, leaves for Thanksgiving, wreaths for the Christmas holidays. I can't even remember half of it." Kathryn pressed on. "It's priceless."
"You know what's even sicker?" I added. "I'd want to get cozy under my sheets with a mug of hot tea and read every goddamn word of that insane manual before bedtime."
Excerpted from THE MANNY by Holly Peterson Copyright © 2007 by Holly Peterson.
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