Review: The Agency by Ally O’Brien.

Posted March 9, 2009 by Rowena in Reviews | 5 Comments

Main Character: Tess Drake
Grade: 4 out of 5

Meet Tess Drake. She has everything she needs. Now it’s time to get what she wants….The Agency.

I spent my weekend reading this book and I must say that it was very easy to read. There wasn’t a lag in the storytelling and I found myself drawn to Tess’s character even though I should have probably detested her. What I liked about her was that she’s very brash and she’s very crude and yet, there was something so endearing about Tess that you couldn’t help but be friends with her and want things to work out for her. It surprised me how much I liked Tess even though the life that she leads is so far from what I would approve of (judgemental bitch that I am).

Tess has many enemies. She’s got more enemies than she has friends and for a long time, she was totally okay with that. She even preferred it that way because it made her seem hard and strong but over the course of this book, she starts to see that making enemies isn’t the way to live life. It’s also not the way to start her own agency either.

Let’s see what’s wrong in Tess’s life right now. Her boss just died leaving her most hated enemy at work in his shoes…which means, that now her enemy is her new boss. Then she’s having an affair with a married man and her life is just twirling all out of control and she goes through the shitter throughout this book but man, it was an enjoyable ride. You couldn’t help but cheer her on because even though she had all these enemies, she was such an enjoyable character. She wasn’t perfect and she was just so normal and as the book progressed, you wondered if she was ever going to woman up and do right for herself and when the book ends you’re hopeful and kind of disappointed.

My only complaint about this book was that the end was rather abrupt. We’re treated to all of these problems popping off one after the other and then we get to the end and it just ends. Everything comes to a screeching halt and though alls well that ends well, I still would have liked more closure with everything. The way that the book ended made me think that there’s going to be another Tess Drake adventure in the form of another book but I can’t be sure since I can’t find a hot dang thing anywhere.

As a whole, this book was an enjoyable read. There was lots of insider information to what goes down in the publishing industries (something that us as readers would really get a kick out of) and it was a lot of fun getting to know Tess Drake and her assistant and then Oliver. I even liked Tess’s father. It was a lot of fun and I would recommend this book to anyone who is looking for a funny read on a bright and sunny weekend. It’s a great way to spend a few hours.

CONTEST WINNER ALERT: The commenter from this post that wins a free copy of The Agency is:

MARIE!

Congratulations Marie, shoot us an email with your name and address to contests[at]thebookbinge.com and we’ll get that book sent out to you as soon as we can. Thanks so much to everyone who entered!

This book is available from St. Martin’s Press. You can buy it here.