What do you think?
Rate this book
City of Likes
Megan Chernoff is a talented but unemployed copywriter in an identity crisis after the birth of her second child. Seeking a fresh start, she and her family move to New York City, where she meets Daphne Cole-a gorgeous, stylish, well-known momfluencer. To Meg's surprise and delight, Daphne shows an inordinate amount of interest in Meg, showering her with compliments, attention, gifts, and all the perks that come with having a massive digital platform. Before she knows it, Meg finds herself immersed in Daphne's world-hobnobbing at exclusive power mama supper clubs, partaking in fancy wellness rituals, and reveling in the external validation she gets from her followers who grow daily by the thousands. Her friendship with Daphne, as well as the world she's been granted access to, is intoxicating and all-consuming. But is it authentic? When Meg realizes she's losing track of what matters most-her relationship with her sons and her husband-the deep cracks in Daphne's carefully curated façade are finally exposed. It's up to Meg to find her way back to her real life. But first she must determine what real even means. Written with Jenny Mollen's signature razor sharp wit, CITY OF LIKES is a compulsively entertaining and unforgettable satire of the seductive allure of social media, as well as an unsettling portrait of female relationships, motherhood, and our pics or it didn't happen culture.
266 pages, Hardcover
First published June 14, 2022
576 people are currently reading
9088 people want to read
About the author
Jenny Mollen
4 books413 followersJenny Mollen is an actress and writer, called one of the funniest women on Twitter by The Huffington Post. She writes for Playboy Online, has appeared in "Wilfred," "Suits," "CSI NY," "Crash", the WB series "Angel", and plays a recurring character in the third season of HBO's "GIRLS."
She is also a wife and mother, married to a famous guy (which is annoying only because he gets free shit and she doesn't).
She is also a wife and mother, married to a famous guy (which is annoying only because he gets free shit and she doesn't).
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 427 reviews
July 25, 2022
Is it just my copy or are there the weirdest typographical errors in this book? Like one word on one page? Sentences that stop in the middle and are indented on the next line? Did anyone proofread, edit or copy edit this book? Wow. I can’t imagine a legit publisher that would let it go to print like that. Never heard of Nacelle Books and there’s probably a reason for that.
April 3, 2022
Empty characters, thin plot and boring story that has seems like it was written by a social influencer.
February 20, 2022
“People don’t follow you for the truth, they follow you for the fantasy. They want to believe if they just owned a pair of Celine sunglasses and a two-toned Rolex Daytona, their lattes would taste a little sweeter, their Sunday scaries would evaporate, and their personal life would come together like the last fifteen minutes of any Nancy Meyers movie.”
Book Dynamics✨
Quick paced
Short chapters
Modern storyline
Under 250 pages
Ahhhh. This one is a fun ride! We’re all aware of Instagram vs reality and this novel dives into it head first.
This is very quick paced and has a nice twist towards the end that I LOVED.
Mollen’s writing is witty and sharp - no surprise if you follow her on Instagram. I was laughing out loud throughout the entire book.
Grab this one if want a fresh take on the “double life” storyline.
Book Dynamics✨
Quick paced
Short chapters
Modern storyline
Under 250 pages
Ahhhh. This one is a fun ride! We’re all aware of Instagram vs reality and this novel dives into it head first.
This is very quick paced and has a nice twist towards the end that I LOVED.
Mollen’s writing is witty and sharp - no surprise if you follow her on Instagram. I was laughing out loud throughout the entire book.
Grab this one if want a fresh take on the “double life” storyline.
July 20, 2022
City of Likes had potential but just never delivered. The concept is good, but the story was rushed. Every character is annoying and it’s hard to relate. Also, this story is extremely similar to The Devil Wears Prada with an ending mimicking Mean Girls. Not super original.
The physical book was terrible to read. The paper is thin and stark white; looked like it was printed in someone’s home office. Whoever edited the layout did a terrible job because pages would have only 1 to 3 words on them before moving to the next chapter, and paragraphs would drop to the next line, even though there was no punctuation denoting the drop.
I wanted so much more from this book in every way.
The physical book was terrible to read. The paper is thin and stark white; looked like it was printed in someone’s home office. Whoever edited the layout did a terrible job because pages would have only 1 to 3 words on them before moving to the next chapter, and paragraphs would drop to the next line, even though there was no punctuation denoting the drop.
I wanted so much more from this book in every way.
July 13, 2023
Can a book really be bad enough to earn a one-star review?
No, that wasn't a question.
Okay, it was a question, but it was also my sad attempt at a reference to "The Devil Wears Prada", because why not? That's just one of the many movies/ books this wannabe tv script/ book is blatantly ripping off.
Jenny Mollen is witty, very witty at times in this story, and I expected more from this book. More wit at least than I was able to generate up there in my cutesy opening to this review. I can tell Mollen is at the least a savvy copywriter from her also very witty and very popular Instagram feed. However, in this case at least, the ability to write topical Instagram captions didn't translate into an ability to craft a decent novel. But this book was never meant to be a novel: it's a spec script for a TV series about influencers. It's pretending to revile them but really carefully, lavishly, lovingly chronicling their every excess, and it's the level of dishonesty and carelessness towards her audience that creeped me out and made me wish I could get my time and money back.
FYI, the show is already in development.
But a book is not a tv show that can distract us from boring plot lines or holes by flashing a shiny Birkin bag or dazzling Patricia Fields' costumes. So nope, the threadbare yet still in-your-face moralizing barely holding together this ripoff of "The Devil Wears Prada" meets "Mean Girls" is not enough to make up a decent novel-- even if this one book has ripped off two better movie plots.
Buckle up your seatbelts, this is about to be a bumpy review.
I rarely give one-star, let alone two-star, reviews, so I feel like I have to justify my own meanness, not that I think Jenny Mollen, who's clearly an influencer not a novelist, would care. (Sorry again if that's unfair. I'm mad that this book insulted my intelligence on so many levels, and I hated how dishonest it was and it just makes me want to be brutally honest in reaction.) Above all, more than the ripoffs of better plots or the moral hypocrisy, what led me to hit the single star button is the gag-inducing, treacly cynicism of this spec script. (I can't call it a book. To paraphrase what Poe once famously said, you can't read a book in a sitting, that's called a short story, but I did read "City of Likes" in one sitting.) So, not a book exactly but yes, it's readable, I'll give it that! Witty at times and readable overall. But the reading of it left me feeling dirty, angry, and morose. I wouldn't wish such a state on even Miranda Priestly... I mean...Regina George... I mean Mollen's version of those villains, Daphne herself.
Don't get me wrong. If Mollen wants to worship the rich, worship them or be fascinated by them or whatever, but don't pretend being poor makes characters "good nuts"... as she puts it at one point. UGH. Also, like what? Mollen isn't poor. She's catering to her audience here, and I find that deeply cynical. Balzac did beautiful things talking about money. Or to be less snobby, so does Sophie Kinsella. Or we can look at Fitzgerald for some fun stuff about rich New Yorkers. Or, to name another NYC author who loved to catalogue the excesses of the elite, Edith Wharton. Or back to chick lit: take any Liane Moriarty novel. Morality is complicated. But so is a real novel. So is life. This book never goes beyond the most basic duality of good and bad. I think it's because the author herself wants to be likable and followed so badly that she's pretending she's Meg, when really she's more like Daphne than she cares to admit. More on that in a sec.
Furthermore, this is what really got me and it was so obvious: Mollen can't actually dislike Instagram-- she has over 400k followers. So it's clear she must kinda like it, and going by her hijinks there she must also like people pretty similar to her cast of sleazy influencers and nouveau riche coke-snorting loons, or why would she so slavishly detail their every excess? That's what bothered me the most: the lack of honesty. Mollen is writing a book to influence/ appeal to gals with fewer followers than herself and she's feeding them a line that Instagram doesn't mean all that much, there's no place like home, Toto... BUT it's just a line. It's just more influence: Mollen herself must enjoy Instagram. A take like that-- a take that encompasses the good, bad and ugly of IG-- and Mollen must find IG at least a little rewarding or how could she have 400k plus followers???--along with the ridiculousness of influencer culture would have been so much more refreshing and HONEST.
That said, now let's talk about Mollen's Mary Sue MC by the name of Meg. So Meg is SUCH a good person that she [ spoiler] eschews the temptation of Instagram and leads a life of virtue with an almost nunly devotion to her littles? Ugh. Yuck. Why. Huh. Yawn. Let's look at that. Is that believable?? Not to mom shame, but, seriously, what kind of saintly mom would leave a (possibly still) nursing infant (we never get much deets on Meg's baby) for a weekend away when she knows her husband has to work nights and she doesn't even secure proper childcare? Like what?
Instead of childcare, Meg relies on her husband's very batty sister to take charge of her two tiny kids, one of the least believable and most contrived characters who's only in existence as she's convenient for the plot and 100% not the kind of person you count on to take care of an infant and a toddler overnight, let alone for a whole weekend. The sister, who has more free time than any 20-something I've ever met in NYC, is a plot device to allow this supposedly "poor" character, who doesn't have the means to pay for a nanny, the freedom to hang with Daphne.
Anyway, I do know moms like that, who don't care who they leave their kids with, but they're also not that into their kids. We're supposed to buy that Meg is this concerned, caring mom. Meanwhile, she has AN INFANT, not to mention a toddler, and she doesn't even have her phone on her at all times while she's overseas and is not checking in regularly? Like, huh?? Especially once the childcare situation gets even trickier and she ends up having to leave her tiny ones with a total stranger? I'm not here to judge Meg-- I'm judging the story, but COME ON. That's just not believable. Either Meg is not actually a good mom or she's not a well-written character. It's one or the other. No mom of a young infant would behave like that. It just wouldn't happen. Does Jenny Mollen not have kids or friends with kids or editors with kids? It was annoying, but I could have gotten over the plot holes. That's not why I'm so mad.
As for the occasional witty lines-- and there were some good ones in there, I have to be fair-- you can tell Jenny IS a funny, smart writer...at least of Instagram captions, and there are some good captions in the story. She just can't sustain a thought for longer than a joke or a fortune cookie. And she is a good observer of Meg's behavior. She's "self-aware" as so many NYC influencers like to dub themselves, not realizing it's just another mask. None of the other characters, besides Meg, the one clearly based on Mollen, are believable, although Daphne is sometimes funny and Meg, her MC, is mostly believable minus some bizarrely callous behavior towards her dog and her infant child, but, overall, I'm mad because this book will make money and it will make a stupid TV show and ugh, I'm so sick of it. I'm sick of being dumb enough to buy books like this. I'm sick of the cynicism I can practically smell in the room when this book was pitched. I'm sick of shlock being marketed to me as entertainment. And this book is shlock. It's TERRIBLE, just completely terrible, and worse, it's gag-inducing with its hypocritical moralizing written in bad faith by an influencer herself. It's cynical. It's predictable, and those occasional witty lines don't make up for that. It's...pick-me. That's the word for it.
A lot of women like Instagram and pretty clothes. Like let us like our things, Mollen.
All that said, in those good lines and occasional solid observations, I do see potential for better writing. Maybe Jenny could read some better "women's lit". ANYTHING to help her ditch her deeply cynical "self-awareness" she wears like a shield and spark her to look up from the navel-gazing, and write an honest book about influencers (and herself) that doesn't cater to, or really talk down to the Instagram mommies she so clearly despises. So I feel bad about it, but one star feels fair.
Also, ironically, I got influenced by Not Skinny Not Fat to buy this book. NSNF is a really fun, funny source of pop culture but as for her opinion on books, I won't be taking cues from her anymore. I don't think she actually read this book, either. She watches more TV than anyone I've ever followed, which is fine, but doesn't leave a lot of time for novel reading. But I do hate that she was peddling books like they were another sports bra. I love books. I love good writing. I love the occasional trashy fun read. This wasn't even that. This wasn't even fun. It made me feel bad and dumb and kinda sad. This book was like being forced to go to church and listen to a preacher you know is banging his best friend's wife, but you have to nod your head cause you're in church and you don't want to make a fuss, and then you leave some money in the collection plate and you walk out feeling vaguely ashamed. Well, I can't get my money back, so I hope I can save you yours. And maybe your soul too (jk) :(
No, that wasn't a question.
Okay, it was a question, but it was also my sad attempt at a reference to "The Devil Wears Prada", because why not? That's just one of the many movies/ books this wannabe tv script/ book is blatantly ripping off.
Jenny Mollen is witty, very witty at times in this story, and I expected more from this book. More wit at least than I was able to generate up there in my cutesy opening to this review. I can tell Mollen is at the least a savvy copywriter from her also very witty and very popular Instagram feed. However, in this case at least, the ability to write topical Instagram captions didn't translate into an ability to craft a decent novel. But this book was never meant to be a novel: it's a spec script for a TV series about influencers. It's pretending to revile them but really carefully, lavishly, lovingly chronicling their every excess, and it's the level of dishonesty and carelessness towards her audience that creeped me out and made me wish I could get my time and money back.
FYI, the show is already in development.
But a book is not a tv show that can distract us from boring plot lines or holes by flashing a shiny Birkin bag or dazzling Patricia Fields' costumes. So nope, the threadbare yet still in-your-face moralizing barely holding together this ripoff of "The Devil Wears Prada" meets "Mean Girls" is not enough to make up a decent novel-- even if this one book has ripped off two better movie plots.
Buckle up your seatbelts, this is about to be a bumpy review.
I rarely give one-star, let alone two-star, reviews, so I feel like I have to justify my own meanness, not that I think Jenny Mollen, who's clearly an influencer not a novelist, would care. (Sorry again if that's unfair. I'm mad that this book insulted my intelligence on so many levels, and I hated how dishonest it was and it just makes me want to be brutally honest in reaction.) Above all, more than the ripoffs of better plots or the moral hypocrisy, what led me to hit the single star button is the gag-inducing, treacly cynicism of this spec script. (I can't call it a book. To paraphrase what Poe once famously said, you can't read a book in a sitting, that's called a short story, but I did read "City of Likes" in one sitting.) So, not a book exactly but yes, it's readable, I'll give it that! Witty at times and readable overall. But the reading of it left me feeling dirty, angry, and morose. I wouldn't wish such a state on even Miranda Priestly... I mean...Regina George... I mean Mollen's version of those villains, Daphne herself.
Don't get me wrong. If Mollen wants to worship the rich, worship them or be fascinated by them or whatever, but don't pretend being poor makes characters "good nuts"... as she puts it at one point. UGH. Also, like what? Mollen isn't poor. She's catering to her audience here, and I find that deeply cynical. Balzac did beautiful things talking about money. Or to be less snobby, so does Sophie Kinsella. Or we can look at Fitzgerald for some fun stuff about rich New Yorkers. Or, to name another NYC author who loved to catalogue the excesses of the elite, Edith Wharton. Or back to chick lit: take any Liane Moriarty novel. Morality is complicated. But so is a real novel. So is life. This book never goes beyond the most basic duality of good and bad. I think it's because the author herself wants to be likable and followed so badly that she's pretending she's Meg, when really she's more like Daphne than she cares to admit. More on that in a sec.
Furthermore, this is what really got me and it was so obvious: Mollen can't actually dislike Instagram-- she has over 400k followers. So it's clear she must kinda like it, and going by her hijinks there she must also like people pretty similar to her cast of sleazy influencers and nouveau riche coke-snorting loons, or why would she so slavishly detail their every excess? That's what bothered me the most: the lack of honesty. Mollen is writing a book to influence/ appeal to gals with fewer followers than herself and she's feeding them a line that Instagram doesn't mean all that much, there's no place like home, Toto... BUT it's just a line. It's just more influence: Mollen herself must enjoy Instagram. A take like that-- a take that encompasses the good, bad and ugly of IG-- and Mollen must find IG at least a little rewarding or how could she have 400k plus followers???--along with the ridiculousness of influencer culture would have been so much more refreshing and HONEST.
That said, now let's talk about Mollen's Mary Sue MC by the name of Meg. So Meg is SUCH a good person that she [ spoiler] eschews the temptation of Instagram and leads a life of virtue with an almost nunly devotion to her littles? Ugh. Yuck. Why. Huh. Yawn. Let's look at that. Is that believable?? Not to mom shame, but, seriously, what kind of saintly mom would leave a (possibly still) nursing infant (we never get much deets on Meg's baby) for a weekend away when she knows her husband has to work nights and she doesn't even secure proper childcare? Like what?
Instead of childcare, Meg relies on her husband's very batty sister to take charge of her two tiny kids, one of the least believable and most contrived characters who's only in existence as she's convenient for the plot and 100% not the kind of person you count on to take care of an infant and a toddler overnight, let alone for a whole weekend. The sister, who has more free time than any 20-something I've ever met in NYC, is a plot device to allow this supposedly "poor" character, who doesn't have the means to pay for a nanny, the freedom to hang with Daphne.
Anyway, I do know moms like that, who don't care who they leave their kids with, but they're also not that into their kids. We're supposed to buy that Meg is this concerned, caring mom. Meanwhile, she has AN INFANT, not to mention a toddler, and she doesn't even have her phone on her at all times while she's overseas and is not checking in regularly? Like, huh?? Especially once the childcare situation gets even trickier and she ends up having to leave her tiny ones with a total stranger? I'm not here to judge Meg-- I'm judging the story, but COME ON. That's just not believable. Either Meg is not actually a good mom or she's not a well-written character. It's one or the other. No mom of a young infant would behave like that. It just wouldn't happen. Does Jenny Mollen not have kids or friends with kids or editors with kids? It was annoying, but I could have gotten over the plot holes. That's not why I'm so mad.
As for the occasional witty lines-- and there were some good ones in there, I have to be fair-- you can tell Jenny IS a funny, smart writer...at least of Instagram captions, and there are some good captions in the story. She just can't sustain a thought for longer than a joke or a fortune cookie. And she is a good observer of Meg's behavior. She's "self-aware" as so many NYC influencers like to dub themselves, not realizing it's just another mask. None of the other characters, besides Meg, the one clearly based on Mollen, are believable, although Daphne is sometimes funny and Meg, her MC, is mostly believable minus some bizarrely callous behavior towards her dog and her infant child, but, overall, I'm mad because this book will make money and it will make a stupid TV show and ugh, I'm so sick of it. I'm sick of being dumb enough to buy books like this. I'm sick of the cynicism I can practically smell in the room when this book was pitched. I'm sick of shlock being marketed to me as entertainment. And this book is shlock. It's TERRIBLE, just completely terrible, and worse, it's gag-inducing with its hypocritical moralizing written in bad faith by an influencer herself. It's cynical. It's predictable, and those occasional witty lines don't make up for that. It's...pick-me. That's the word for it.
A lot of women like Instagram and pretty clothes. Like let us like our things, Mollen.
All that said, in those good lines and occasional solid observations, I do see potential for better writing. Maybe Jenny could read some better "women's lit". ANYTHING to help her ditch her deeply cynical "self-awareness" she wears like a shield and spark her to look up from the navel-gazing, and write an honest book about influencers (and herself) that doesn't cater to, or really talk down to the Instagram mommies she so clearly despises. So I feel bad about it, but one star feels fair.
Also, ironically, I got influenced by Not Skinny Not Fat to buy this book. NSNF is a really fun, funny source of pop culture but as for her opinion on books, I won't be taking cues from her anymore. I don't think she actually read this book, either. She watches more TV than anyone I've ever followed, which is fine, but doesn't leave a lot of time for novel reading. But I do hate that she was peddling books like they were another sports bra. I love books. I love good writing. I love the occasional trashy fun read. This wasn't even that. This wasn't even fun. It made me feel bad and dumb and kinda sad. This book was like being forced to go to church and listen to a preacher you know is banging his best friend's wife, but you have to nod your head cause you're in church and you don't want to make a fuss, and then you leave some money in the collection plate and you walk out feeling vaguely ashamed. Well, I can't get my money back, so I hope I can save you yours. And maybe your soul too (jk) :(
June 23, 2022
Ironically bought this after being influenced on Instagram (I'm looking at you, Casey Wilson and Busy Phillips). It was just okay.
August 22, 2022
skewers momfluencers and the NYC influencer in general, in the IDGAF way that Jenny has!
November 21, 2022
Quick read, pretty flat plot and almost nonexistent character development. A slow semi-interesting start that rapidly petered out into a rip-off of Mean Girls influencer edition. 3 stars for sympathy. ⭐️⭐️⭐️
June 20, 2022
Finished it, but definitely wouldn’t recommend. I follow Jenny on Instagram and she’s hilarious. Her nonfiction books have also been delightful. This just wasn’t good.
June 14, 2022
Jenny Mollen's sarcastic and witty humour shines through in this fun summer read, that reminds us that not everything is real on social media and to be present in our day to day lives.
September 22, 2022
"Stop, being glued to your phone. Counting followers and likes and ignoring your friends."
—Mean Girls the Musical
The above quote sums up City of Likes by Jenny Mollen perfectly! I didn't know about this novel until I saw it mentioned in People. I knew I had to check it out after that. It's like Sex and the City meets Workin' Moms, or something to that extent. It's mostly a lot of lighthearted fun with many humorous moments. It's also a social commentary about how far people will go to become influencers and there are lessons to be learned.
There were times I had trouble keeping up with who was who in the story, as so many different names were mentioned throughout. The extravagance also got to be too much at times.
This novel was enjoyable overall, but definitely a caricature. It actually reminded me of The Saturday Wife in a strange way. (Mostly with how the main character becomes friends with a rich, influential woman, and how things go off the rails as a result.)
Megan: Molly Ephraim
—Mean Girls the Musical
The above quote sums up City of Likes by Jenny Mollen perfectly! I didn't know about this novel until I saw it mentioned in People. I knew I had to check it out after that. It's like Sex and the City meets Workin' Moms, or something to that extent. It's mostly a lot of lighthearted fun with many humorous moments. It's also a social commentary about how far people will go to become influencers and there are lessons to be learned.
There were times I had trouble keeping up with who was who in the story, as so many different names were mentioned throughout. The extravagance also got to be too much at times.
This novel was enjoyable overall, but definitely a caricature. It actually reminded me of The Saturday Wife in a strange way. (Mostly with how the main character becomes friends with a rich, influential woman, and how things go off the rails as a result.)
Megan: Molly Ephraim
Daphne: Sarah Wright
Lauren: Zibby Allen
Iliya: Sebastian Stan
Marina: Elena Satine
Seth: Ben Foster
Vigo: Thomas Ian Nicholas
August 3, 2022
Is there a single character is this book who isn’t painstakingly annoying? Let me get this straight — Meg’s husband can’t handle watching his own children for 3 days? Meg, a full blown adult, is desperate for the attention of an influencer and apparently gives into peer pressure as easily as a middle school aged kid? Aaand Daphne wants to reproduce for more content? Ahhhh, yeah, mission accomplished on writing empty, shallow characters. Overall, the story just felt empty and lacked substance. Easy enough read, but what was the point?
July 26, 2022
An easy, breezy summer read. I found some parts of this book and the way social media was positioned to be incredibly dated and oddly off the mark for an author that is so very online. But the illustration of narcissism and power dynamics felt very, very real to me and for that part of the story, I was hooked. Not a pulitzer price winning a book, but a fun read that surely will inspire a giggle or a gasp.
August 11, 2022
This book was so stupid I can't even believe I legitimately read the whole thing. The writing was eh, there was no build up to Meg's eventual "obsession" with social media, the random lesbian undertones???? None of it added up to a cohesive story for me. And the ending was so stupid, it was like the ending of Mean Girls that was fake, before they actually decided to write a not lazy/random ending.
September 13, 2022
this was objectively terrible but i finished in a day hence the two stars
February 5, 2023
I think we should just never use our phones ever again
July 25, 2022
Somewhat enjoyable but so over the top…
July 15, 2022
A good lighthearted read - until the end. The book speeds up way too fast in the last 10% of the book, making the ending feel unresolved. The author randomly kills of the dog for not a good enough reason. Animal deaths are pretty triggering to a lot of readers, so I’m shocked the author did that without it being crucial to the plot. Also, for a book released in June 2022, the author may be should have read the room a bit more about Ukranian and Russian culture. It’s quite unlikely that the characters from Russia would seek out their culture in America through going to Ukrainian restaurants etc. I felt this was in poor taste with the war going on, and serves as a gross generalization that they’re the same culture when they’re completely separate cultures. These are all super small (but impactful) parts of the book which is why I was so disappointed - the book would’ve been great otherwise.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 8, 2022
I read this in one sitting. City of Likes is a story of the dark side of social media and being an influencer. It shows us how what’s being posted is rarely real and how it can devastate your real relationships and priorities like motherhood, work and marriage.
It also hits on themes of women finding their identity again after having kids or pausing their careers to stay home. While some of it may seem far-fetched, the truth is that it reads more like nonfiction than it should. Full of humor and wit, this was a fantastic read.
It also hits on themes of women finding their identity again after having kids or pausing their careers to stay home. While some of it may seem far-fetched, the truth is that it reads more like nonfiction than it should. Full of humor and wit, this was a fantastic read.
March 27, 2025
A lájkok városának legnagyobb bűne az, hogy az egész könyv egy hatalmas kihagyott lehetőség. Mollen könnyen, szórakoztatóan ír, és jó érzékkel kezdte el felépíteni a történetet, amit aztán a biztonságos, klisés moralizálás kedvéért elhagyott.
Főszereplőnk egy kétgyerekes anya, aki éppen újra munkába áll, és a szerencse összehozza egy nagyon divatos, New York-i anyainfluenszerrel, aki a szárnyai alá veszi, és Meget is elkezdi felépíteni, mint egy Kicsi Én-t. A kettejük kapcsolata gyorsan mérgezővé válik, Meg elfordul a családjától, elégedetlen lesz a férjével, valamint az új barátnőjével nyilvánvaló szexuális vonzalom van köztük (és ezt most nem belemagyarázom, van itt csók és a másikra maszturbálás is). Röviden: van itt anyag, amivel dolgozni lehetne - fejtegetni a házasság és az anyaság dinamikáját, biszexualitást/ nők egymás iránti vágyát, vagy azt is, hogy a social media hogyan adja meg ideig-óráig annak a figyelemnek és szeretetnek az illúzióját, amit sokan kergetünk. Ehelyett sajnos Mollen gyorsan lekerekíti a történetet, a szánkba rágja, hogy nem minden arany, ami fénylik a interneten (sem), és hazaküldi a hősnőjét a langymeleg, (szerintem kifejezetten magányos) házasságába, ami nagy kihagyott lehetőség, mint mondtam. Kár érte, voltak nagyon jó pillanatai.
Főszereplőnk egy kétgyerekes anya, aki éppen újra munkába áll, és a szerencse összehozza egy nagyon divatos, New York-i anyainfluenszerrel, aki a szárnyai alá veszi, és Meget is elkezdi felépíteni, mint egy Kicsi Én-t. A kettejük kapcsolata gyorsan mérgezővé válik, Meg elfordul a családjától, elégedetlen lesz a férjével, valamint az új barátnőjével nyilvánvaló szexuális vonzalom van köztük (és ezt most nem belemagyarázom, van itt csók és a másikra maszturbálás is). Röviden: van itt anyag, amivel dolgozni lehetne - fejtegetni a házasság és az anyaság dinamikáját, biszexualitást/ nők egymás iránti vágyát, vagy azt is, hogy a social media hogyan adja meg ideig-óráig annak a figyelemnek és szeretetnek az illúzióját, amit sokan kergetünk. Ehelyett sajnos Mollen gyorsan lekerekíti a történetet, a szánkba rágja, hogy nem minden arany, ami fénylik a interneten (sem), és hazaküldi a hősnőjét a langymeleg, (szerintem kifejezetten magányos) házasságába, ami nagy kihagyott lehetőség, mint mondtam. Kár érte, voltak nagyon jó pillanatai.
September 16, 2023
I absolutely adored this book! The author, Jenny Mollen has a sense of humor that is out of this world!!! I couldn’t read this book fast enough. The main character of this story is Meg and she is trying to juggle the life of 2 kids and a husband in New York when she meets a internet influencer. Meg tries to and being an influencer to her already heavy load. Read this book to see how she handles it all.
September 29, 2024
Although there were a few laughs in this book and I liked the concept, overall I would not recommend to any of my friends! None of the characters were likeable, the editing was terrible (so many big glaring mistakes like sentences being chopped in half, speech marks missing etc) and I truly hated the ending
September 15, 2025
This book surprised me. Being that this is a book about New York City mom influencers, I was expecting a lot of cheese. But this seemed pretty realistic.
A cute and quick read! Would recommend especially if you live in New York or love pop culture!
A cute and quick read! Would recommend especially if you live in New York or love pop culture!
July 11, 2022
City of Likes follows copywriter Meg Chernoff as she navigates her way through moving from LA to NYC while becoming a new mom of two and trying to find a new job. Through all of this - she finds herself, too. Her husband, Iliya works at a high-end private social club, and this is where Meg runs into #momfulencer Daphne Cole. Daphne is perfection and Meg is definitely charmed by her. Meg is surprised when Daphne takes a keen interest in her and starts tagging her on Instagram, making her something of an overnight sensation. But as Daphne pulls her further into her world, Meg starts to realize that it’s not everything it seems.
Jenny has been one of my favorite follows for years now, so this may seem like a love letter to her - but I think she’s an amazing writer and just plain funny as fuck. We were both pregnant and postpartum at the same time, and reading her memoirs at that time was so fun. It felt like we went through it together to an extent. I had the opportunity to hear her speak at The Strand last month, and it was amazing to hear how much work she put into this book. If you follow her, you know she took inspiration from her own life with this story, as well. I really hope we see Meg Chernoff again in the future in print - but I know we’ll see her on TV because it’s currently being developed as a series. I can’t wait! I loved this book and I hope you do too!
Jenny has been one of my favorite follows for years now, so this may seem like a love letter to her - but I think she’s an amazing writer and just plain funny as fuck. We were both pregnant and postpartum at the same time, and reading her memoirs at that time was so fun. It felt like we went through it together to an extent. I had the opportunity to hear her speak at The Strand last month, and it was amazing to hear how much work she put into this book. If you follow her, you know she took inspiration from her own life with this story, as well. I really hope we see Meg Chernoff again in the future in print - but I know we’ll see her on TV because it’s currently being developed as a series. I can’t wait! I loved this book and I hope you do too!
July 10, 2023
I love Jenny Mollen and cried laughing at her memoir/essay books, so I was absolutely thrilled to see her venture into fiction. But this was GOD AWFUL. It's boring, cliché, cheesy as hell, and not smart enough to be the satire it thinks it is. Every female character is vapid with a brain the size of a grain of sand (even/especially her protagonist who's supposed to be Not Like Other Girls), and while I get that's kind of the point for the purposes of the mommy influencer world-building she does here, it's just not interesting or new or fun or anything worth reading. Maybe if she'd written this in 2015 it would've been a more groundbreaking take but there have been two billion think pieces about influencers since then that all say in a few thousand words what Mollen stumbles through across 250 pages. The whole debate is just tired at this point, and even more so if you're not bringing anything new to the conversation. She also clearly had no idea how to end things, so she just...used the "Mean Girls" ending. No joke. A real disappointment, sadly.
June 26, 2022
A fun, quick read! Really enjoyed the twists and turns in this funny book.
January 6, 2023
4.3⭐️; Hardcover; Humor/Satire;
What a portrayal of social medias grip on our reality! Mollen does a fantastic job depicting the allure of validation and public approval. This story will show you that you shouldn’t believe everything you see online. It’s a highlight reel.
Meg was extremely relatable and her snappy remarks were hilarious. Daphne was a hoot, until she wasn’t.
Some of the paragraphs were a bit janky in parts (sentences breaking mid-way into new paragraphs) but it’s easy to overlook.
Looking forward to reading more by Mollen!
What a portrayal of social medias grip on our reality! Mollen does a fantastic job depicting the allure of validation and public approval. This story will show you that you shouldn’t believe everything you see online. It’s a highlight reel.
Meg was extremely relatable and her snappy remarks were hilarious. Daphne was a hoot, until she wasn’t.
Some of the paragraphs were a bit janky in parts (sentences breaking mid-way into new paragraphs) but it’s easy to overlook.
Looking forward to reading more by Mollen!
November 3, 2022
Depressingly shrill and vapid with a very unattractive portrait of an influencer - what a life that must be, like a hamster endlessly running in a cage with the supposed eyes of the world upon you. Throw children into the mix and it becomes a bit repulsive. The book is physically so badly put together too. If they're going to throw money at trying to find the next Proust of social media, why not make the thing nice to hold and look at? I realize I'm putting this in the Kindle edition review because I can't find the hard copy one but perhaps it's just as well in the long run.
December 15, 2022
This book was kinda dumb and I’m a sad it was the one that completed my reading challenge. It was bout influencers in nyc but it just felt way too over the top and I didn’t really like any of the characters. There were also way too many characters for how short the book was so I feel like I didn’t remember who anyone was. It was short and easy to read tho.
August 31, 2022
What was that ending? Unlikable characters, cheesy plot, boring storyline.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 427 reviews