Brand X: The Boyfriend Account

by Laurie Gwen Shapiro

Landing an internship at an ad agency isn't what her principal or her mother wanted for Jordie Popkin, aspiring journalist. At sixteen, Jordie is glad of the chance to collect "real world" experience and finds working with the "creatives" at the agency a nice break from her math and science curriculum. And the team likes Jordie, too. When her new colleagues decide to make Jordie's business their business, Jordie is flattered but skeptical. They will come up with a plan to market Jordie to the hottest guy in her grade. From situation analysis to "sex sells," the team assures Jordie that they know what they're doing. She shouldn't get upset if their ideas cause her an embarassing moment or two. Jordie knows that the course of true love never did run smooth and that the ad game isn't a simple set of rules to follow but she can't help wondering about the advantages of letting professionals try to turn her from Brand X into a hot item. The principles of marketing might apply to a bar of soap, but finding the right guy...?

In this humorous novel, Laurie Gwen Shapiro reveals with candor how one girl who feels like "Brand X" not only learns the secret of a successful marketing campaign but also discovers how to assess her true market value to become the brand of choice.

Genres: Young Adult

240 pages, Hardcover

First published October 10, 2006

About the author

Laurie Gwen Shapiro is an award-winning documentary filmmaker and journalist whose writing has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times, New York, The Daily Beast, Lapham’s Quarterly, Slate, Aeon, The Forward, and the Los Angeles Review of Books. Her documentary film awards include an Independent Spirit Award for directing IFC’s Keep the River on Your Right, and an Emmy nomination for HBO’s Finishing Heaven. Shapiro is the 2022 winner of the Silurians Press Awards Gold Medallion for Best People Profile for “He Bombed the Nazis, Outwitted the Soviets and Modernized Christmas” for The New York Times and the 2021 winner of Best NYC Essay or Article from the GANYC Apple Awards for “The Improbable Journey of Dorothy Parker’s Ashes” for The New Yorker. The Stowaway (Simon & Schuster) was her best selling first full-length work of nonfiction, and was an Indie next selection. Her next nonfiction book will be The Aviator and the Showman, for Viking Books. July 2025.

Reviews

[Jennifer Wardrip · Rating 3 out of 5]

Reviewed by Jennifer Rummel for TeensReadToo.com

One sick day changes Jordie's life. The day she's sick is the most important day for determining the required school internships. She really wants the newspaper intern, but misses out on the interviews. Instead she's offered one of the more unique internships, which comes directly from the principal's brother. He works for an advertising agency that makes toys for fast food meals. Fighting to let out her creative side, Jordie is happy to take the position. She just needs to get her mom on board.

Once the position is officially hers, Jordie's mouth gets her into a tad bit of trouble. She lets out some personal information about the "perfect" boy in her pre-calculus class. Convinced that she has a zero chance of dating him, she agrees to try different techniques her bosses suggest. Shared milkshakes, a sombrero, a fake pizza delivery, and a push-up bra episode all end up humiliating Jordie. Can she figure out a way to juggle both her personal life and her internship without becoming a social outcast?

BRAND X: THE BOYFRIEND ACCOUNT takes a typical internship and adds high school drama, creating a book not to be missed. In a strictly science and math school, Jordie struggles to fit in and accept her differences. In understanding herself better, Jordie's outlook on life gains a fresh perspective.

[Chao Hong]

Dear Friend,

I'm reading a book entitled Brand X by Laurie Gwen Shapiro which is a work of Realistic Fiction.
This book was about a girl named Jordie making important decisions of high school life that might change her path forever. This book made me realized how high school is very important to us because we need education as the key to access to our future. This book reminds me of my freshman year in Vanguard High School because I did't pay a lot of attention to my 9th grade year. An important lesson I learned from the book is choice your life well, the past could never change but we ca change our future. I'd recommend this book to the people who don't really care about school because school gives us the opportunity to change our future.

[Helen · Rating 3 out of 5]

The thing I liked about this book were the zany creatives, their office, and the general eccentricity of people's behavior. However, this seems to be your typical "girl crushes on boy who turns out to be a jerk but that other, rejected guy turned out to be nice" kind of tale that has been told too many times.

It was a fun fluff read, other than that. It went by fast.

[Jenn · Rating 1 out of 5]

I honestly only read the first 10 pages before I got annoyed and bored, it was very slow and couldn't keep my attention, so I skipped to the last 40 pages and it looked kind of amusing so I read it, those 40 pages were okay, and frankly I wasn't confused at all. I guess I didn't have to read the whole book

[Heather · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pretty average fluff book

[Allie]

I found this book quite predictable, and would have liked a little twist to it. However, i did like the ending. This is a pretty average book though.

[Abby · Rating 2 out of 5]

A neat little predictable high school story. Read like a 30 minute sitcom. Not as good as her adult stuff.

[Savita · Rating 4 out of 5]

Actually a 4.5, but...

[Wisterious Woman · Rating 1 out of 5]

I only read the first chapter or so. The blub on the cover made it sound like a fun book. It might be 'wildly humorous' but it didn't grab my interest at all. The book seems to 'talky' to me.

[Angela9600 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting- not quite what I was expecting based on reading the back of the book.