Sad Desk Salad

by Jessica Grose

[Leah]

When I heard about Sad Desk Salad, I wasn’t entirely sure if I wanted to read it. I mean what kind of title is Sad Desk Salad? However, despite finding the title just a little bit strange, I decided to go ahead and see exactly what the book was about — and after reading it, although I still don’t think the title sufficiently sums up the book, it IS a part of the book therefore, it works. I thought the synopsis sounded excellent so when I saw it was on Edelweiss to request to review, I went ahead and requested it, and was approved which made my day and I duly started reading that evening.

Sad Desk Salad is one of the only novels I’ve ever read to focus on what it is to be a blogger, in this case, a celebrity blogger (think TMZ, Perez Hilton etc). Alex Lyons has a job most people would dream of, spending her days on her sofa writing up stories for the gossip website Chick Habit. The juicier the better, as far as Alex (and her bosses) are concerned because all that matters in the blogging world is page views, page views, page views. So when Alex is sent a juicy exclusive – a perfect mum’s (and politician) young daughter snorting coke it goes without saying that Chick Habit will indeed publish it, but publishing the video has repercussions for Alex she never dreamed of. Repercussions that not only threaten her, but also threaten her job, her friendships and her relationships, but is it just too late for Alex to do the “right” thing?

I quite liked Sad Desk Salad. It wasn’t perfect, but for what it was I enjoyed it. The novel takes place over the course of a few days, but in those few days, Alex’s life is turned upside down. As much as I liked Alex as a character, I found her to be wanting. She just couldn’t see the way she was acting was just not good at all. She wasn’t at all culpable with the video she posted, blaming everyone but herself, and I just sort of wanted her to admit she was struggling. Admit she was wrong. Instead of trying to carry on with things as if it were normal. As if treating your boyfriend terribly is an OK thing to do. Basically, I think I just wanted her to get a bit of a grip, I wanted a bit more oomph and passion.

However there were bits of Alex I liked. I thought her job gave us a fab insight into the celebrity blogging world. Her narration was excellent and even when I most wanted to strangle her, I still wanted to carry on reading because she was just a brilliant to read heroine and her narration was very much the kind I enjoy reading. I will very much be on the lookout for a second novel by Grose. She clearly is a good writer, and with a little bit more depth and oomph into a character, she can probably pull off an even better novel. Despite it’s weird title (I said it makes sense, I still think it’s a strange title, although I will settle for calling it quirky), Sad Desk Salad is very much a title worth your time. A novel about blogging is so rare (surprisingly so, actually, now that I think about it) and Grose is very on the money with Alex and Chick Habit.