|
Andrea
Stanfield lied. It wasn't a huge lie; It was a little lie
to get a better job. Somehow the lie snowballed and grew so
much that Stanfield couldn't take it anymore. Her compelling
memoir, Phony!, is her confession.
Stanfield
was a smart young woman who did well enough in high school
but found college less than stimulating and decided to quit.
Upon entering the workforce, she discovered that many opportunities
were closed to her simply because she lacked a bachelor's
degree. So she lied. She made up a degree from a real college,
and because employers didn't routinely Google applicants in
the 1990s, she got a good job with the opportunity for growth.
Various promotions and new jobs later, Stanfield was heading
a department of over 40 people. Her intelligence and business
sense were so obvious that no one ever questioned whether
or not she had a degree. Even her mother believed she finished
school at some point, although she should have known better.
What
makes Phony! not just an average memoir is Stanfield's
choices with her writing. In the early parts of the book,
she comes off as a flippant, cocky, self-assured, and rather
shallow young woman obsessed with her good looks and the trappings
of success. She doesn't make herself out to be sympathetic
in the least. But it's obvious that she's got charisma and
managerial skills and a way with office politics. She treats
her employees well, and in return they do all the work that
she's not capable of doing. As Phony! progresses, Stanfield
starts to unravel, and it's hard not to feel sorry for her.
By this point she's gained weight, is very stressed out, and
has little connection with her daughter or husband. She develops
panic attacks and has a difficult time traveling for work.
She's terrified that her duplicity will be discovered and
she'll lose her job, leading to the loss of her big house,
expensive cars, and possibly her marriage and any respect
her daughter had for her.
As Stanfield
begins to explore her motivations for wanting all the accouterments
of a glamorous life, she begins to realize that maybe she
didn't want this after all, that maybe she just wanted it
because she thought this was what everyone wanted. She recalls
some particularly telling moments from her childhood when
she expressed a desire to work with animals and her mother
dissuaded her. She starts to understand that perhaps she's
spent all this time pursuing a dream that belonged to someone
else.
The main
flaw with Phony! is that there isn't enough time and
attention devoted to important turning points. For example,
Stanfield spends quite a bit of time telling readers about
how her mother tried to mold her and her sister into what
Stanfield thinks her mother wanted to be herself, but the
author never gives specific examples or tells us how she felt
about this as a child. Was she happy to do what her mother
wanted? Resentful? Or simply obedient? Readers never know.
Stanfield spends too much time telling and not showing, and
she's not yet adept enough a writer to pull that off effectively.
But,
despite its flaws, Phony! is fascinating. It turns
out that Stanfield is not only a natural manager, she's a
natural storyteller. She barrels through the events with a
tornadic force and keeps the story moving forward. Her book
is not too heavy on analysis, and this plot-heavy memoir will
keep scandal-hungry readers more than entertained.
(November,
2008)
|
