e: A Novel

If you work in advertising, this book is must read.

intretsing email scenarios in ad agency

Disliked the length of time for delivery. Item very good.

This is THE FUNNIEST book I've ever read!!I have the second part (e2) and the Christmas edition as well.Please, Matt Beaumont keep writing :D

Das Buch erzählt auf eine erfrischende Art über die Geschehnisse einer Londoner Werbeagentur. Dabei werden die verschiedenen Charaktere des Bürogeschehens herrlich überzeichnet dargestellt und jeder findet den einen oder anderen Kollegen seiner Arbeit unter anderem Namen in diesem Buch wieder. Einfach herrlich zu lesen, dass es auch anderswo nicht anders ist...

I read E Squared before reading this novel, which strictly could be described as its predecessor; however I didn't find reading them in the "wrong" order to be detrimental. Some of the characters from E are in E Squared but there is sufficient background to be able to pick up the narrative as required without having to worry about any previous action.The book is all email based, as is explained in other reviews. The whole action of the story is based around the email correspondence of various characters, mainly the characters based in an advertising agency pitching for some prestigious accounts, and trying not to make a mess of the accounts they already have. The people, if you have ever worked in a professional services firm, are horribly familiar - bitchy, nasty, two-faced, precious, petty, bullying, autocratic, self-serving in the main. The emails range from vitriolic (though ever so politely written in the correct office etiquette generally) to utter sucking up to the boss. Sigh ... sadly all too familiar from some of the places I've been (un)lucky enough to have worked in in previous lives.E is hilarious - there were a lot of `laugh out loud' moments - for example, when one of the characters asked if it was all right if they came to a meeting in their Nirvana t-shirt, and the respondent said "Come as you are". If you get that, you'll find it as funny as I did.The characters are so reminiscent of people that actually exist that it's rather like the fascination of the horrible, reading this book - you know it's all going to end up badly, but you can't look away.Thoroughly enjoyable - light, undemanding reading, but the storyline is entertaining, the characters are all too clearly drawn, and the reader is keen to know what happens next.Totally recommended.

95 reviews already as I'm writing this, 74 of which gave 'E' a 5-star rating... is there still need for more praise? Perhaps not, but I just couldn't resist. Until a few years ago - until 2007 to be precise - I worked in advertising myself (as an account, I'm not sure if I qualified as 'the sad git in accounts' mentioned on the backcover), and back in 2000 when I first read this book I had to laugh out loud because it was so very very recognizable, the only thing missing seemed your typical financial director: always keen on blaming other people when clients protest invoices but never having met a client face-to-face themselves. I vividly remember sharing the book with colleagues, and not a single one of them wasn't struck by the similarity with people we actually knew and had to work with every day. On the other side, I just as vividly remember the often mind-boggling lack of intelligence on the client side (think 'Fawlty Towers' in a marketing context and you'll come close), so one could easily write a similar book from that perspective I guess.Anyway, that was almost a decade ago and recently (don't know exactly why) I took 'E' from my shelves again, opened it and was captivated once again from the very first page. In retrospect I found it perhaps more over the top than when I first read it, but just as funny, and what I failed to notice the first time struck me all the more now: this is really a very cleverly plotted novel! And as much as in epistolary novels dating back hundreds of years such as  Dangerous Liaisons (Penguin Classics)  the characters all come very much alive in their e-mails. If you want to know what life in advertising is like 'E' may not give you a trustworthy objective view (though it comes close), but it will definitely have you laughing out loud. Dangerous Liaisons (Penguin Classics)