Startup

February 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.

Starred review from February 15, 2017
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.

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March 1, 2017
Mack McAllister, 28, is proud to be part of the (underestimated, he thinks) New York tech scene with his app TakeOff, which is all about making people feel better all the time. Sabrina thinks Mack hired her to diversify TakeOff; she's an Asian-American mom of two and, at 36, ancient. In the same building, 24-year-old Katya is devoted to covering companies like Mack's for TechScene, the website she's a reporter for under Sabrina's husband, Dan. It's time for Mack to hit up VCs (venture capitalists, if you have to ask) for next-level funding, while downstairs at TechScene, staff are being pushed to new levels of competition for the best stories. Could a misstep on Mack's part make Katya's career? Shafrir, a culture writer at Buzzfeed News, imbues her propulsive first novel with a strong setting and a firm handle on hypercurrent tech jargon. While everyone's obsessing over followers, likes, retweets, and comments, Shafrir smartly dissects age, gender, and workplace politics. Her closely studied cast of interconnected, true-feeling characters and fluid prose will appeal to fans of Emma Straub.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)