A gorgeous, poignant, and heart-breaking story of a father, a wife, and a daughter in a catastrophic situation caused by their strong lack of communication and the power social media holds.

'Talk to Me' is a wonderful piece that I see myself recommending friends to read.

I'm surprised by how much I enjoyed reading this book.
Beautiful and Heartbreaking, Talk To Me, is a powerful read.
This book is one I know I would read again.

Published by G.P. Putnam's Sons on January 15, 2019

“I made a mistake. I apologized.” Why isn’t that enough? Ted Grayson, a long-time network anchor, asks that question after a bad birthday leads to a moment of bad behavior. The aftermath spirals out of control. The incident says something about Ted but it does not reflect a pattern of behavior. Balanced against a distinguished twenty-year career, the incident seems, if not trifling, at least an aberration. Should Ted be fired? I don’t know. And I like the fact that Talk to Me presents that question in a way that allows the reader to consider the pros and cons without demanding a knee-jerk decision.

Ted is depressed because nightly news anchors are unimportant in the internet age. He feels he is “a vapid, empty shell of a person, with no real relationships and little to no integrity” who had “given up long ago on being a journalist.” Ted lives entirely inside his own head, which is not a pleasant residence. He substitutes petulance for an expression of honest feelings. He loves his wife and daughter and he shows his love in his own way, but it isn’t in him to give them the constant attention and affirmation they crave. He is far from being a sociopath, but he has never been good at empathy or kindness. His ability to distance himself from life is why he can be an objective news anchor.

Ted’s wife, Claire, offers a first-person soliloquy about marriage and the (in her view) inevitable deadening of spirit caused by accumulated years of monogamy. She wants to be the only priority in her husband’s life despite enjoying the fruits of his demanding career. She doesn’t want to recognize that the new man she met after all those disappointing years, the one she’s counting on to save her life, is just another man who will inevitably fail to meet her long-term demands. But he’s happy and attentive, at least for the moment, and Ted isn’t, so that makes the new guy attractive. It is easy to see Claire’s point of view, just as it is easy to understand Ted’s.

Ted has a meltdown on his birthday during a commercial break. He calls a young intern a Russian whore because she has broken his rule against standing in his line of sight. She is actually Polish and has given Ted no reason to question her character. In true corporate fashion, the network fires the intern because she responded by giving Ted the finger. But the network is old media and it doesn’t realize that everything that happens in the world is captured on someone’s cellphone video and eventually ends up on Facebook or YouTube, where privileged men who never stopped being frat boys will laugh at it while decent people will be appalled.

The story, as they say, is drawn from the headlines, but unlike Matt Lauer or Bill O’Reilly, Ted does not have a history of abusing women. His wife doesn’t like Ted much, but she knows he’s not a misogynist. He’s just a guy who is coming apart at the seams. The reader is therefore left to wonder whether an uncharacteristic but ugly incident of inappropriate language should cost Ted his job. I assume different readers will have different opinions, which is one of the reasons Talk to Me tells such a fascinating story.

In fact, while Ted is plagued by his own demons, the novel refuses to demonize him. His teenage daughter is a mess, but the extent to which Ted is to blame is unclear. Ted might behave like an asshole, but doesn’t act like a privileged asshole despite the wealth and prestige that comes from being a network anchor.

The novel contrasts old media with internet reporting by introducing Henke Tessmer, whose website operates on the principle that objective truth is unimportant. Clicks are important. Clicks generate advertising revenue. The more outrageous a story might be, the more clicks it will receive. Responsible journalism, according to Tessmer, is a thing of the past. Website owners make their own rules. Adults should take responsibility for deciding whether a story is true, a view that leaves Tessmer’s website free to disguise click-bait lies as news. Clickeat emptor is Tessmer’s motto.

Ted’s daughter Franny works for Tessmer. Her reaction to the viral video of her father — and Tessmer’s request that she write a story about it — kicks off another plot thread that will contribute to Ted’s destruction. Claire’s reaction to the video kicks off another. None of the characters in Talk to Me are entirely sympathetic — Claire and Franny are intensely focused on their petty complaints about Ted and seem oblivious to the harm they have caused him — and none are without fault.

The novel touches on a variety of timely issues. Misogyny. Underrepresentation of women in the news media. The clash between free speech and morally offensive speech. Whether hecklers should be empowered to prevent people they dislike from explaining their actions. Whether campuses should disinvite unpopular speakers in response to student or faculty protests. Whether there are, or should be, any rules in the age of the internet. Whether social media, designed to promote interaction, has ironically raised the heat level of discourse to a degree that makes it impossible for people who disagree to talk to each other. Whether society is now so sanctimonious that none of us are allowed to make a mistake. Whether the collective willingness to forgive mistakes has been lost because the internet has become a permanent, easily accessed record of those mistakes. Whether self-righteous commentators and bloggers will never forgive because, secretly, they are happy that their own secrets have not been exposed.

The story tells some hard truths about redemption. It might be desirable but, contrary to what we are told in novels and movies, it isn’t always possible. Not every broken relationship between child and parent can be repaired. “Because with enough pain, with enough time, we close the door on those people and we do not let them back in.” Yet some people in the novel, generally broken people or people who are recovering from broken lives, find it possible to feel empathy for Ted, and the story suggests that in the end, forgiveness might still be the best response to sincere remorse.

Talk to Me occasionally depicts political correctness in a way that is unnecessarily exaggerated. There were times when I had the suspicion that John Kenney was trying to soft-peddle headline-grabbing misconduct that clearly merits the termination of employment by equating Ted’s transgression with talking heads who engaged in a long pattern of sexual harassment. On balance, I think Kenney took care not to do that. There are lines that need to be drawn and I don’t think Talk to Me suggests otherwise. It does suggest that not all misconduct deserves the equal condemnation that it so often receives.

There are also times when Talk to Me gains power through exaggeration. I didn’t quite buy Claire or Franny, two good people who, at times, behave atrociously toward Ted, knowing that he doesn’t deserve to lose everything important in his life while contributing to his loss. That seemed a bit over the top, but it also adds layers of drama to the story’s depth.

Bad actions should have consequences, but people generally deserve forgiveness. How can those competing values be reconciled? I don’t know the answers to the most difficult questions that Talk to Me asks. I appreciate the fact that Kenney asked them because the questions are important. I also appreciate that he asked the questions in elegant prose that he used to tell a fascinating story.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

I'm between 3 and 3.5 stars.

"But deep down in places he rarely allowed himself to go, Ted knew he was a lie. A handsome, large-headed, reasonably intelligent lie. They had made him this thing, this...character, this cartoon, really, where once, long ago, Ted had been a reporter. A writer."

Ted Grayson is a well-respected television news anchor. At 59, he's one of the last bastions of the "old guard" of news media, as television networks battle with cable and internet for ratings and advertising dollars. The definition of what is "news" has also changed since he got his start, and at times he doesn't even recognize the industry he's working in.

But while he is well-regarded by the viewers, his family doesn't have the same opinions about Ted. He and his wife, Claire, have been estranged for some time (following a long period of time where they were estranged even while living in the same house). She is weary after years of neglect, infidelity, and Ted's need to chase a story instead of actively participate in his marriage. Ted's daughter, Franny, hates him. Nothing he does is not deserving of scorn, even if Franny has more than her own share of issues.

"Life changes. This was the essence of news. Why did it come as such a shock to an anchorman?"

One night, in the middle of a newscast, things go spectacularly awry. Ted loses his temper and goes on a profanity-laced and misogynistic rant. It's a momentary lapse, but it doesn't wind up on camera, so everyone is hoping it will blow over. But then it hits the internet, and then it's a matter of minutes before Ted, and everything he represents, wind up in big trouble. Everyone has an opinion, and none of them are anything less than career-ending.

Franny, who works for a popular "news" website, watches her father's downfall with bemusement. But when it is suggested that she interview Ted for an article to help bolster her somewhat-flagging prospects at the site, she isn't sure whether she really hates her father enough to make career hay at his expense. Ted, on the other hand, wonders if it matters at all what Franny writes. Maybe he does deserve everything that's coming to him. Or maybe it's an opportunity to gain some control of himself before it really is too late.

John Kenney's Talk to Me is the story of a man whose career—and his life—are in freefall. It's a look at what it's like to finally have to come to terms with the choices you've made and whether you would make them again, and at whose expense you've made them. Ted's problems aren't unique—we've seen this type of story play out many times in real life, both involving celebrities and "real" people.

At the same time, this is a book about our scandal-hungry society, how the media loves to put people up on a pedestal only to gleefully knock them down when they make a mistake. It's a commentary about how quickly bad news, errors, or misdeeds travel, and the ripples they cause. It's also a look at the balance between news and entertainment, and how easy it has become to confuse the latter for the former.

When the book focused on Ted and his downfall, and how clueless he really was about the ramifications of what he did, I really enjoyed Talk to Me. But the more it focused on the outrage caused by Ted's rant, the reactions of those in society and the media, and the machinations of Franny's boss, I didn't find the book as interesting. I guess I feel like we're living in that society right now, and I didn't need much more of an analysis of how angry and unforgiving we can be to those who do things we perceive to be egregious.

Kenney is a great writer, and he has achieved a tough feat of making you care about unlikable characters. Ted and Franny in particular were complex, flawed yet sympathetic characters whose trajectories I understood. I didn't feel as if Kenney gave Claire as much depth, and I found a tangential storyline with an old roommate of Franny's to be mostly unnecessary.

So while I wasn't head over heels for Talk to Me, there are enough redeeming qualities to recommend it. There's some real emotion here amidst the melee, and it is those moments that make this book worthwhile.

NetGalley and PENGUIN GROUP Putnam provided me an advance copy of the book in exchange for an unbiased review. Thanks for making this available!

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. I really liked this author's writing style and felt for the leading character, Ted. We watch as his whole life just crumbles around him and wonder what would we do in the same situation. This story shines a light on just how far social media and fabricated "news" can destroy lives. It will make you think. It did for me.

25% into it and I still have no idea why I am reading it. Way too slow, not interesting. A newscaster yells at the make up person and because he is an important man, he gets away with it. Too much of it n real-life. I don't need a story about it.

Whatever comes tough but tender-hearted - John Wayne, a badly-baked pie ? - the same can be said of this novel. Supposedly hard-boiled in its attitude to the media, the trolling of our era, all the bad and nasty business of life today, the book also lays claim to soppy stuff like fathers and daughters, and long buried love coming back to life. Thus this is a work that aspires to modernity while remaining deeply planted in the traditional past. Does it work? Up to a point, but only if you like a sentimental ending to a snarky story.

I was prepared not to like this story. I don't know why, but I did not have high hopes. It started out a little slow. Certainly main character, Ted Grayson was not very likeable, but then that really made the story. The story is very current, white man behaving badly, quite publicly as Ted is a TV news anchor. It's all caught on camera, Ted loses his job, but it could be the best thing that ever happened to him. He's already treated his soon to be ex-wife badly, he's estranged from his adult daughter Frannie, but to the TV viewers he has been a trusted newscaster. Now it seems everyone can agree, Ted is a disgrace. There's plenty of dark humor to lend a lighter twist to the story. By the end, I enjoyed the story and was sad to see it end.

Oh boy this was a rough one... I find it SO hard to feel bad for men who do really stupid things. But at the same time, you can't, as a human being, NOT feel bad about another human being who has been humiliated, lost everything and is really, seriously broken.

I found myself reading this in a cycle... "What a jerk!" "Oh poor guy!" "OMG he's such an A$$!" "Yikes, take it easy on the man!" I was starting to feel a bit carsick at times! This story hooks you in from the very first page, What goes down in the first chapter is shocking, and you won't want to put this down until you find out how we got there...

Ted Grayson knows how to tell a story. After all, he's been doing it for 20 years as the lead anchor on a TV station. But suddenly, he's become the story - and this public figure, trusted by many viewers, finds himself falling deeper and deeper into a state of despair as his life crumbles around him. People are shocked - but his family is not. He's been a really sh*tty husband and an even worse father, so his support system is truly lacking. Will Ted ever be able to survive the end of his career, his reputation, and every relationship he's ever known?

I loved reading this darkly funny story and it was a fast read for me. Ted Grayson is a really unlikeable character, but I loved to hate him and at times even found myself rooting for him. Ted's very public fall from grace is swift and watching a man meltdown is never easy, but boy does it make for a fun book to read!

I loved John Kenney's last book, Truth in Advertising, so I was thrilled to be given the ARC of his next book, Talk to Me. Truth in Advertising opened with a very funny (not haha funny, more dry wit funny) scene shooting a diaper commercial with Gwyneth Paltrow, but then as it goes on, it becomes much more deep and insightful than it seemed at first. This book, however, was deep and insightful the whole way through, and I am not saying that as a bad thing.

Talk to Me is about a famous news anchorman named Ted who is 59. His marriage to his wife Claire is basically dead, but he had no plans to do anything to make it better and was fine just going on as it was. As if that isn't nad enough, he is also estranged from his almost 30-year-old daughter, Franny. On his birthday, he learns that Claire is finally ready to call it quits because she met someone else and she wants a divorce. Ted reacts by screaming offensive slurs at an innocent make-up artist. An incident which, unfortunately for Ted, happened to be captured with a witness' cell phone and shared over social media. Following this very bad day, Ted's entire life proceeds to unravel, which is really saying something, considering the condition his life was in when this unfortunate incident occurred.

This book made me think of Jon Ronson's awesome nonfiction book, So You've Been Publicly Shamed. Both of these books look at how people's lives can be ruined after one incident, when that incident is shared on social media over and over, with more and more people piling on, commenting and sharing. Of course, the people who are caught making bad choices or doing bad things are not blameless. However, the question is, are the responses always proportional to the bad thing/bad choice? The answer is no, not always.

In addition to the issue of public shaming, this book is also about an aging baby boomer realizing that he is no longer master of the universe. Not only is he getting older, but entire institutions are shifting and changing. Truth is no longer "the truth", the news is no longer "news". The main character's daughter, Franny, is not only estranged from him, but she works in "new media", at a blog, with a boss who believes all that matters is getting clicks and shares. Franny eventually has to decide how far she is willing to exploit her relationship with Ted to get ahead at work.

As can be seen from my review, I found this book is very thought provoking and timely. I adore John Kenney's narrative voice. He is so good at writing people with dry, irreverent wit and crisp, real-life dialogue. Despite delving into weighty topics, this books was not a heavy or slow read. I felt like I got to know the three main characters, and I missed them when I finished the book.

I am already looking forward to his next book, and I can't wait to see what topics he tackles next.

*Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for my digital ARC in exchange for an honest review*

I won a copy of this galley through the Shelf Awareness giveaway. Thanks so much for the early look!

I recently read or heard something that talked about how our current culture makes it difficult to acknowledge imperfection. I was reminded of an interaction I had on a social media thread a few months ago. The discussion was regarding non-gendered language, and I made the comment that, while I completely understood and agreed with the concept of how gender in language can influence our perception of reality in both subtle and non-subtle ways, that I still had some difficulty with the usage of “they” to refer to a single individual. I explained that whenever I heard one of my children refer to a friend using “they” or “their” followed by grammatical terms used for a singular subject, I had to fight the urge to correct them.

This comment was met with pure hostility on the part of one of the commenters, who stated that there was so much in my statement that was hurtful and bigoted that she (she referred to herself as female, but used non-gendered language for her partner) couldn’ even begin to unpack it all. When I stated that I had honestly no idea how what I said was offensive and asked her to help me understand so that I could try to do better the next time, she responded that it was not her responsibility to educate me and that she found it offensive that I would even ask.

I still have no idea what part of my comment offended her, particularly in light of the fact that it was meant mostly to poke a bit of fun at my own difficulty changing my long-held grammatical views even when I knew they were becoming outdated. And I think that is why the recent comment about mistakes being verboten in current society resonated so much with me. In order to forgive a mistake, you have to inherently believe that the person who made it didn’t mean to cause pain or harm. If, instead, you believe the worst of people, anything they do that causes you pain, even if they claim it was in error, feels like it is communicating an underlying truth that they normally seek to hide.

That is a very long intro to my review of this book, which revolves around the fallout of a completely inappropriate outburst by a famous newscaster that is caught on video and goes viral. The book follows him in the aftermath of this event, chronicling the ways that media, both traditional and on-line respond to this event, and how public opinion, as expressed through on-line comments and event protesters alter the way his behavior is reported.

This is an extremely timely story and the outrage expressed for his inappropriate behavior is right on target. But, Kenney’s take on this situation is thankfully much more nuanced. The newscaster has spent many years neglecting his relationships with his wife and daughter, and his wife has told him that she wants a divorce just a few minutes before he has this tantrum. As much as this is a story about a privileged white man behaving badly, it is also the story of a man who, as he grows older, finds himself full of regret for all of the mistakes he has made in the past. And yet, everything and everyone surrounding him works against his attempts to try to atone for those mistakes.

I found his fond memories and regrets about long-past events quite moving and relatable, and the ending, while not completely happy, was full of foregiveness in a way that felt hopeful.

I identified with the main character more than I anticipated, and this book was both wistful and a more enjoyable read than I expected.

I received an advanced reading copy from the publisher via NetGalley. Thanks!