Slicker

by Lucy Jackson

Even life in the greatest city in the world can sometimes feel like a little too much. For this New Yorker, running away to the Heartland may be just the antidote.

When New York City native Desirée Christian-Cohen flees her sometime-boyfriend, unhappy mother, Nina (who's recently learned her soon-to-be ex-husband Patrick is gay), and failing grandfather, she picks the flight plan by randomly dropping her finger on a map and hitting: Honey Creek, Kansas, population 1,623. And if being a "tourist" in Honey Creek weren't noticeable enough, try hanging out in the Sweet Tooth luncheonette, where you're referred to as "half a Jew." Wary of , but wanting to, fit in with the local populace, Desirée is forced to defend herself and define herself in a world that feels vastly different from her own. Her Yale boyfriends were never like Bobby McVicar, the son of two ageing hippies, who finds all he needs in his pinprick of a hometown. And never—even as an only child of typically doting Manhattan parents—has anyone paid so much attention to Desirée.

Over one surprising, transformative and sometimes very funny summer, Desirée Christian-Cohen, member-in-good-standing of the Self Esteem Generation, discovers how an impulsive escape from home and family turns out to be much more than that.

Genres: Fiction, Chick Lit, Adult Fiction

272 pages, Paperback

First published July 26, 2010

About the author

Lucy Jackson is the pseudonym for an acclaimed short story writer and novelist whose fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, Best American Short Stories, and many other magazines and anthologies. She lives in New York City.

Reviews

[gille · Rating 2 out of 5]

I can't lie, I was pretty disappointed by this book. It was overly prose-y and I was so bored it took me like two weeks to read 260 something pages. I really liked Posh, but I was not that into Slicker at all. I didn't connect with any of the characters, I didn't feel sympathy for them, and I generally did not care what happened to them. I am not looking for a sequel, it doesn't really matter to me what happens to Desiree or Nina.

I felt like Jackson was trying to be literate, to use fancy words, more than trying to craft a well-told story. Sure, the characters were fine. They had some substance. But the style of writing made me want to poke out my eyes. I understand this is a talent and that Jackson is surely a very talented writer, but this was over the top.

Skip it.

[Martha · Rating 1 out of 5]

Okay. The book should come with at label to warn readers of the horrible language throughout the book. The characters were all selfish and only seemed concerned with sex. The premise of the book started out as a cute idea, that is why I picked it up. But by the end the book is about gay marriage and that love (not platonic or family), no matter who loves who, should be the most important thing in life and everyone else needs to be happy for them. What a book to ruin my day. Don't even bother picking it up. If I could give it negative stars I would.

[Julie · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was ok. I agree with one of the other reviews about the ending. I was so disappointed. It fell flat and left too much hanging. My general feeling was that the book mocked traditional values and life outside of NYC. As a reader from a city in the midwest I was irritated over and over again by the author's protrayal of country life and the people. Does she really think everyone outside of NYC is a complete uneducated idiot?

[Ronya · Rating 2 out of 5]

Don't bother. Reminded me of a poor man's Sweet Home Alabama except for the fact that, because it was a book, I couldn't fast forward through the bad parts (of which there were many). I know I could have stopped reading, but it was like a train wreck.

[Aw · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good story til the end. It's totally flat. Nothing worse then plugging along reading a book to find the ending lacking in substance. Kind of like working and not getting paid at the end of the week.

[Lindsey · Rating 2 out of 5]

..read half of it ..lost interest.

[Sbrows · Rating 1 out of 5]

Well I can say that the author values proper grammar and feeling superior, while feigning self-awareness of superiority. It was not a good book. The author portrayed all Christians as anti-Semites while simultaneously mocking Christianity. There was nothing funny or entertaining about this book. Really hard to care enough about the characters to get to the end. Will probably cross this author off my list after reading this.

[Sue Strazy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Meh. Thought the ending was a little bland. Enjoyed parts of the story, but also thought some of the small town parts were just a little too exaggerated.

If I can find it at the library, though, I am going to give Posh a try. Guess this story wasn't THAT bad!

[Mary · Rating 2 out of 5]

The "New York myopia" that everything outside that one city is filled with rural bumpkins who have never seen a traffic jam is very tiresome.

[Rebecca · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was kind of lame. Wannabe "real lit" in the form of chick-lit, I hate that. Suck it up and be girly, no one cares! Girl is home in NYC from Brown(?) for the summer. Her parents recently divorced because her dad came out as gay and moved in with his partner. Her mother is falling apart. They get into a huge fight and the daughter takes off to the middle of bumble-fuck Kansas and sets up shop in a small town for the summer to do nothing. Of course, said town is filled with colorful trash and she immediately falls for and with the town hottie. His parents are hippies who never got married and when the town finds out, such scandal!! His mother also runs a support group for the who ever has problems in the whole town and one night, they get held up at gun point and they steal all the Girl's money so she has to call her mom to send her more. I don't really know why this is a huge turning point in the story, but I am sure there is subtext, which I hate because I never understand it. Blah. Anyway, the Girl's father and partner come out to the town to bring the Girl home on the wishes of her mother because her mother is freaking out that the Girl is going to stay with the hottie and drop out of Brown to go to KU or something. The Girl ends up coming back to NYC to see her mother and clean up everything and get her stuff and we never find out if she returns, more subtext. Like I said, wannabe "real lit", but really just boring and kind of lame. I have no sympathy for people that run away and then complain that their parents don't support them. It's just not my culture.

[Kevin Connery · Rating 2 out of 5]

Good characters, decent storyline (if incomplete), decent setup, but the very odd 3rd-person narrative mode variant felt very pretentious, and made it hard to get involved in the story. Similarly, the very thing the author used the same approach to stereotypes that she had the main character objecting to. (If this was deliberate, it was too subtle for me to identify; it felt like she was deliberately putting down people just as she had her negative characters in the book doing.)

[Patricia · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun read. Young woman moves from New York to Honey Creek, Kansas and has adventures. Author Lucy Jackson, by the way, is a fake name for Marian Thurm. Honey Creek, KS is a fake name, too.

Food: I guess a good fake snack would be marshmallows. You think you're eating something when you snack on marshmallows but then you realize you've eaten, like, nothing. You've swallowed a chunk of sweet air.

[EllieVreads · Rating 2 out of 5]

Cute enough story, so two stars for "it was ok," but the author made people who live in small farm towns, look stupid, racist, and homophobic. She also chose to incorporate every negative stereotype into every Christian character. That was not okay.

[Constance Michelle Nestler · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm glad I got this at the Dollar Tree and didn't pay full retail for it. No character development. No real ending. I wouldn't have liked the ending they were hinting at anyway. I liked the mother's storyline more than the spoiled daughter's.

[Kelly]

nope, it took about 5 chapters for me to realize no good.

[LInda L · Rating 4 out of 5]

cute as a button -- I liked it a lot. wonderful descriptions of a small town.

[Melflowers · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was an ok book. I will definitly read more from the author.

[jessica wilson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Leaps and bounds more enjoyable to me than Posh. I think maybe because the characters were more interesting (quirky) and the overall mini-stories all tied into each other.

[Caroline Greig · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book more than I did but still found worth persevering with.

[April · Rating 2 out of 5]

average story with a weak ending.

[Julie White · Rating 1 out of 5]

I read 5 pages before I took it back to the library.

[Lesley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Weirdly, this isn't the first book I've read in which a character transfers from an Ivy League school to the University of Kansas.

[Rachel Reiners · Rating 2 out of 5]

I do not agree with the review on the cover but it wasn't a horrible read. A story of one's self discovery and love at the age of 20.

[Jennifer · Rating 2 out of 5]

Found the book to be pretty predictable.