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Mercury in Retrograde

by Paula Froelich (Goodreads Author)

3.05 of 5 stars 3.05 · rating details · 735 ratings · 170 reviews

When Mercury is in retrograde, the only guarantee is anything that "can" go wrong, will.Penelope Mercury, an intrepid reporter at the "New York Telegraph," has pounded the pavement for five years from city borough to borough, carrying out her boss's eccentric orders to break stories that seem inconsequential to everyone but him. Finally, she is inches away from being promo...more

Hardcover, 272 pages

Published June 2nd 2009 by Atria (first published May 15th 2009)

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Jan 14, 2012 Rita rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: escapist-pure-entertainment, fiction, chick-lit

When does 2 + 2 + 4 + 2 + 3 + 2 = 1 star? For me it happened in the process of writing my review for Mercury in Retrograde by Paula Froelich. First, a few disclaimers: In general, I am not a reader of chick-lit, I have never seen an episode of Sex in the City, and I have never spent time in New York. However, since my day job (I’m a junior high school teacher) is pretty demanding, I sometimes want to unwind after an evening of grading papers and writing lesson plans by reading something relative...more When does 2 + 2 + 4 + 2 + 3 + 2 = 1 star? For me it happened in the process of writing my review for Mercury in Retrograde by Paula Froelich. First, a few disclaimers: In general, I am not a reader of chick-lit, I have never seen an episode of Sex in the City, and I have never spent time in New York. However, since my day job (I’m a junior high school teacher) is pretty demanding, I sometimes want to unwind after an evening of grading papers and writing lesson plans by reading something relatively mindless. I have a wonderful group of female friends, I do have a healthy sense of humor, and frankly I love poking fun at people who think they are better than everyone else. So when I found Mercury in Retrograde on a remainders table at a nearby bookstore, I decided to buy it because the cover blurbs promised something along those lines. Big mistake.

When I grade my students’ writing, I use the six-trait model. Six aspects (or “traits”) of the writing are analyzed and rated on a scale of one to five (five being the best). The equation at the beginning of this review refers to the ratings I would give various traits of this book if I were to grade it the same way as I grade my students’ writing. Following are the rationales for each rating:

Ideas and Content-2. Given the genre of this book, Froelich did an adequate job of inventing diverse main characters—a journalist, a lawyer, and a socialite-cum-fashion designer—but then did little to make me like them or even remain interested in them. They seem to like each other mostly because intermediaries among them (the de rigueur gay guy friend and the equally obligatory-character-in-a-chick-lit-book-or-movie yoga instructor) say they should like each other. There is no moment of profundity, hilarity, or anxiety that allows us to see why they bond with each other. Most of the secondary characters are stereotypical (Marge, David, Neal, Trace, Bitsy, Jack, and Penelope’s characterization-by-telephone parents, to name a few). The romantic interests of the three main characters were underdeveloped. Froelich seemed incapable of writing a fun, romantic scene, preferring instead either to close the bedroom door on the characters or to have them exchange life stories. If there is anything worse than a writer who tells rather than shows, it is the character an author creates telling rather than showing. (A fan-fic writer might have a great time writing action-packed vignettes that reinvent the romantic relationships contained within this book. But I digress.) The overall story arc had potential, but took too long to get off the ground (see more on this under “Organization” below).

Word Choice-2. Although she used words such as wafting, cooed, and sartorial, I had the sense that she had originally written float, said, and tailored, then used a thesaurus when she realized she needed spicier words. Regarding profanity, I’m no prude, but I found the shock-value words thrown in as adjectives in the main characters’ dialogue to be somewhat unnatural, rather the way my seventh graders talk when they don’t know I overhear them. They seem to be practicing profanity so that by the time they are 17 or 18 years old they are really good at it . . . I had that same feeling whenever I ran into an instance of the f-word being used in this book.

Conventions-4. Yes, she knows how to spell correctly, capitalize, and use commas, periods, and question marks. Or if she doesn’t, there was an editor who fixed things up for her. Some of her sentences had rather tortured syntax--maybe that should be mentioned under sentence fluency, but I'm putting it here because a writer should know which words serve what purpose in their writing, and that amounts to understanding the conventions of writing in my mind.

Organization-2. Some Goodreads reviewers indicated the first third of this book seemed a little slow. I concur. Other reviewers mentioned their frustration with Froelich’s penchant for jumping from one character to another within the same chapter. I didn’t have a problem with this per se, as Froelich clearly delineates scenes within a chapter using the device of astrological forecasts as lead-ins to the upcoming action and focal character. However, the chapter divisions themselves seemed somewhat arbitrary. Furthermore, too much of the first third of the book was devoted to one of the characters (Penelope), so that it seemed she was initially intended to be the sole main character with Lipstick and Dana serving as secondary characters. As the stories of Lipstick and Dana were fleshed out in later chapters, it became clear to me that each of them was a main character, but their stories were developed too far into the book to make good sense, with their problems being somewhat too handily resolved. The final chapter of the book seemed to be more of an epilogue than a critical part of the story itself, with dreadfully poor writing of the told-rather-than-showed variety. The book didn’t need to be longer, just more tightly written in the first third to allow for adequate character development, plot resolution, and denouement.

Sentence Fluency-3. In six-trait analysis, a rating of 5 would be given for sentence fluency if the writing would sound great when read out loud, but that is definitely not the case with Mercury in Retrograde. Some of the rubrics I’ve used to grade papers on sentence fluency indicate that routine and functional sentence structure merits a rating of 3. A rating of 1 would be given if the sentences didn’t make grammatical sense, so I guess I really can’t go that low. But there were some sentences with convoluted structure, so a 3 seems generous. I’m probably setting the bar pretty low for a published work of entertainment to merit a mid-range score with merely routine and functional sentence structure, so this is a rather grudging 3.

Voice-2. Going back to rubrics for six-trait writing one more time, a rating of 3 is given if the writing is on the edge of being funny and if the writer’s personality pokes through here and there. Definitely, there are a few genuinely funny lines of dialogue, but most of the funny stuff in this book is poorly written slapstick (Marge, the NY Access blind-as-a-bat-hard-of-hearing receptionist, Penelope’s parents-by-telephone, for example). If I had found the book to be harder to put down either by virtue of the wit or the individuality of the writing, I might have rated voice a 3, but because there was so little in this book that was truly amusing or compelling I’m going with a 2.

The Goodreads blurb for this book describes the author as well-connected, which I believe, as I cannot imagine how this book would have been published (frankly, I can’t even imagine this book would have been given a read-through by an editor’s assistant) without those connections. Had one of my students written it, I would have thought it was not a bad effort, but then again, my students are twelve and thirteen years old. Although I have read (a lot of) other popular fiction that I have thoroughly enjoyed by authors with true talent, for this to make it into print truly makes me think it’s not what is written but who writes it that matters most in the world of popular publishing. Often I give away books after I have read them, especially if they are hardback, which my copy of this book is, but I’m inclined just to put this one in my recycle bin with that the hope that the paper it is printed on will be transformed into something else that is more readable.
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Sep 03, 2010 Terri rated it 4 of 5 stars

Yes, it's an easy read. Yes, it is a book to get away with. Yes, there is a character named "Lipstick". But don't let that frighten you away!

I thought this was a clever "upper-class meets middle-class" book of how friends can come from the strangest places. Three very different young women in three very different stages in their lives help each other make it through to tomorrow. A rich girl with a $7,000-a-dress habit, a lawyer who's lost herself, and an advertising lifer with nowhere to go but...more

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Nov 17, 2009 Jemima rated it 4 of 5 stars

This fun story focuses on three young women who live in the same apartment building in New York city. There lives are in chaos of one form or another. Dana is a divorced lawyer who is having difficulty in getting on with her life. Other than work the only place she ever goes is to Weight Watchers meetings. Penelope has been fired from her job at the Telegraph and is running out of money to pay her bills. Another character nicknamed Lipstick is a wealthy socialite who has been cut off from her pa...more

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Aug 09, 2009 Claire rated it 3 of 5 stars Recommends it for: this is amusing chick lit

Shelves: grownup-books

A contemporary novel set in New York City when Mercury goes into retrograde and cuts a swath through the lives of three women, who in normal circumstances would Never meet. Penelope Mercury is an entry level reported for an Enquirer type tabloid aspiring to move from covering stories on the gritty streets to the courtroom beat. The day Mercury slides into place she inadvertently set the newsroom on fire, loses her promotion to a well connected slacker and is shocked to hear the word, "I quit!" l...more

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May 28, 2009 Rachel Bussel rated it 5 of 5 stars

have to admit, I was a little skeptical of a book with a main character named Lipstick, but Paula Froelich won me over with this juicy, fun read that's perfect for anyone who's ever lived in New York, worked a crappy job, had their family expect too much of them, or had relationship troubles. In other words, everyone. Riffing on the world she knows well, Froelich has reporter Penelope Mercury running all over the city under horrible conditions, only to be fired and wind up with one of the crazie...more

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Jun 27, 2009 Robin rated it 2 of 5 stars Recommends it for: those who like lighter fiction

Recommended to Robin by: ARC from Shelf Awareness

Shelves: fiction, 2009-list, arcs

It was odd when I received the ARC for this title because it had an entirely different cover than the one you see pictured here. What they did for the promotional copy was to use quotes from the blurbs different writers wrote about the title. Clever but confusing for me because when I saw the cover I expected an entirely different kind of book!

But, that said, I enjoyed this book and it was fast reading. I'm sure both my sister or sister-in-law who read a lot will enjoy this too. Another odd aspe...more

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Feb 16, 2010 Sarah rated it 4 of 5 stars

Mercury in Retrograde is chick-lit in all its glory, with close glimpses inside the life of socialites and fashion designers. The novel is incredibly short under 300 pages, making the novel a fast and fun read, but also not lasting long enough for readers who truly enjoy the chick-lit genre.

This book is very light and enjoyable once you get used to the cadence of the author's style. It was heavy for me personally at first, only because I do not keep up with socialite and fashionistas in general,...more

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Dec 01, 2009 Toni rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction

I saw a review recently that gave this book one star. I totally disagree. This book was funny, smart and entertaining.

The book is named for the title character, Penelope Mercury, who is a struggling reporter at a mid-level, slightly tabloid-y newspaper. The opening pages find Penelope having a serious FML day as she has to chase a story in the freezing cold with a photographer who won't let her ride in her car, while she battles a horrible head cold and a tyrannical boss. Also featured are Lena...more

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Jul 19, 2009 Ket Lamb rated it 2 of 5 stars

If you're a devoted follower of the New York Post's Page 6, you'll probably devour this semi-entertaining, albeit predictable, tale of twentysomethings in the city. Sloppy syntax, shallow characters, and a story that doesn't get started until almost a third of the way through, however, will test every one else's attention. So will Lipstick's silly name. (Do you really want to read about a protagonist named after a cosmetic?) Granted, the title refers to a planetary phenomenon, but it's never pro...more

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Aug 24, 2009 Deirdre added it

Despite a mildly formulaic feel and a very happy but a little too pat ending, I was surprised at how thoroughly I enjoyed reading this book. Three down-on-their-luck women end up in the same SoHo apartment building and rebuild their lives largely through their helpful and often hilarious interactions with one another. Each character is well-conceived and carefully drawn, and watching them wrestle with personal and professional failures (and eventually successes!)was made highly engaging by Froel...more

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Jan 18, 2011 Kathy Hiester rated it 4 of 5 stars

I thoroughly enjoyed Mercury in Retrograde by Paula Froelich's . I expected a hint into a kind of daily life that I have always wanted, one with money, glitz, and glamour. What I got was a comedic story that archives real people. It entails three women whose positions place them in each other's pathways and whose choices create new lives for each of them.
Penelope Mercury, the first character and the namesake of the novel has to go to great lengths to keep what is in effect a horrible job but whe...more

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Jul 04, 2009 Gina rated it 3 of 5 stars

I was one of the lucky winners of a free copy of this book through Goodreads. The book got better as it went, and had some very funny parts. The three plot lines tied loosly together, as these very different women came to help each other as friends do. In the end their lives, while connected, where still independent of one another. I'm used to reading novels with one strong plot line so this was a little different reading experience for me. If I reread it I would take more time to tie The horosc...more

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Nov 28, 2009 Csutton624 rated it 2 of 5 stars

Such a predictable book - just another NYC story with a socialite angle. And, I will say, jumping between characters WITHIN chapters is super annoying - and this book does it the entire time. I liked each character - at least they didn't let themselves get walked all over - but I could have told you what would have happened. Such a bust. And I am really tired of NYC books. I LOVE NYC and would live there in a second. But all books these days are the same story/characters, etc. about NYC women. A...more

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Oct 05, 2010 Tiffany rated it 3 of 5 stars

“When Mercury spins between the Earth and the Sun, a condition that astrologers call Mercury in Retrograde, it appears to the untrained eye that it is hurtling backward” although it is not, of course. The phenomenon is actually a shift in the viewers’ perspective and it is during this time period that even the “lowliest of fortune tellers will inform you, Mercury in retrograde means one thing, if something can go wrong it will.” And it does…....

Read the full review here:
http://acozyreaderscorner ...more

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May 03, 2009 Elizabeth Spiers rated it 5 of 5 stars

Paula's one of the funniest people I know, and Mercury in Retrograde is full of the sort of too-ridiculous-to-be-true-but-they-ARE anecdotes that, when told by the author, result in direct incapacitation of one's ability to breathe. If you haven't laughed that hard in a while, consider it a medical warning.

Also: it's nice to see a book in this genre that features women who have careers and actually discuss said careers instead of merely shopping and bitching about men. Especially for those of u...more

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Apr 19, 2011 Connie rated it 3 of 5 stars

I won twelve copies of this book for our book club and we finally got around to reading it! Mercury in Retrograde reads quickly and is reminiscent of Sex and the City. A group of women with seemingly nothing in common become friends due to circumstances that place them in the same apartment building.
While not too "deep" it touches on relationship issues, social status, careers, fashion and romance. The story has some fun humor and a few annoying antagonists. It is a fun read for a beach weekend...more

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May 29, 2011 Kasia S. rated it 3 of 5 stars

Initially I really didn't like the book, maybe the fact that the word p@nis all ready appeared at the bottom of the first page, to me chick lit is supposed to be warm and fun, fuzzy and hilarious with a real sparkle and this felt like a narrative of the characters and why their lives are so whacky. Once I got into the book more I was laughing at some parts, especially when the meeting at Y magazine where Lena Lippencrass works ( socialite wanna be) was going over latest beauty trends and the wor...more

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Jun 07, 2009 Betsy rated it 3 of 5 stars

A great beach read is how I would sum up Mercury in Retrograde. Sometimes fluffy is just the ticket. I liked the vulnerability of the characters and there were many times that I laughed out loud at the characters’ predicaments – especially Penelope’s career foibles at the New York Telegraph and NY Access. I also appreciated the fact that the characters weren’t all ivory tower New Yorkers – they were ‘regular’ Joes with bills to pay and mini-mountains to climb on the way to their fairy tale endin...more

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Jul 08, 2009 Valerie rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: read-in-2009

I saw Paula Froelich on Real Time with Bill Maher a while back and really liked her spunk and wit. Based on that, I looked forward to reading her first novel. Unfortunately, I was a little disappointed. Though a bit of that spunk and wit does come through in Froelich's writing, much of the story is quite formulaic and predictable. The story is about three young women in NYC who find each other at tumultuous times in their lives. I've already seen much of Penelope's storyline in Bridget Jones' Di...more

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Mar 28, 2010 Angie rated it 4 of 5 stars

What a great afternoon read. The book was light and fun Chick-Lit! The story of 3 young women and a couple of queens living in New York. I loved the astrology column type sections introducing the different chapters and scenes. And I know from experience how painful Mercury in Retrograde can be. One of the characters describes herself as more Jew-ish than Jewish. I thought that was clever. I thought--Jew-ish like New-ish, not quite jew, not quite new.

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Jul 30, 2009 Stacy rated it 1 of 5 stars

I didn't really enjoy this one. It was a book club selection for summer, and it was appropriately light. And I like light chick-lit as much as anyone. But I just didn't think it was that interesting or well-written. I didn't find the characters particularly real. It was a lot of fluff. It was written by the editor of Page Six in NYC. It was a quick read, and I should add that many of my book club peers really enjoyed it as beach reading

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Aug 08, 2010 Stephanie rated it 5 of 5 stars

I loved this chick-lit book as did my mom, who read it after me. It's basically about three girls with totally different lives from different backgrounds that end up living in the same SOHO apartment building. Through a series of events, all due to the fact that Mercury is in retrograde, they eventually become friends and help each other discover each one's true selves. The book was funny and had very current references such as SATC as it was published in 2009. For the author's first novel, I th...more

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Jun 24, 2009 Lexi rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: chick-lit-pop-fic

Yet another NYC chick-lit name-dropping frothy book.
Not terrible, but it is what it is.
Not as good as Tatiana Boncampagni for the same flavor, quite like Lauren Weisberger, but infinitely better than the loathsome Candace Bushnell, whose whore-oines have been inexplicably misunderstood as some kind of warped symbols of female empowerment.
It made a decent bath book, if you ignore some absolute howlers in the writing.

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Jul 26, 2009 Laura rated it 2 of 5 stars

This was a very frothy novel about 3 women in NYC who end up in the same apartment building and become friends. The author works for the Page 6 column of the NY Post, so the book is full of name dropping, designers, etc. There were a few very funny moments surrounding the title character Penelope Mercury's job at a cable news channel but for the most part the book is forgettable. A fine read for the beach or pool.

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Jul 20, 2012 Amblingbooks.com marked it as to-read · review of another edition

Shelves: audiobooks, drama

Paula Froelich, a well-connected gossip columnist for the New York Post, brings her insider's perspective to this delicious debut about the bonds of friendship among three very different women.

Listen to Mercury in Retrograde on your smartphone, notebook or desktop computer.

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Mar 13, 2010 Laura rated it 3 of 5 stars

It took me a while to get into this chick-lit, but once I did it went pretty fast. The horoscope framing devise didn't do anything for me, but it was fun to try to guess who the author was describing through her characters (I heard several of them were based on real people). And it ended kind of fairy-tale neat. But not bad for a light read.

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Nov 05, 2009 rebekah rated it 2 of 5 stars

It was a piece of crap. BUT, I secretly enjoyed it cuz I need something easy to read during my challenging workouts. Three chicks, separate lives brought together by one hipster apartment building in Manhattan. There were actually a few glimmers of funny but overall, just another smarmy chic lit book that doesn't make the grade. Dammit.

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May 04, 2009 Linda rated it 4 of 5 stars

Wonderful new format to read! I liked this book form start to finish because the antices of the women characters made me laugh. Paula writes realistic
"fiction" when it comes to describing relationships, the fickle world of work, and women's ideas regarding relationships with men. I read this through my library advanced copy program.

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Dec 27, 2009 Courtney rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: borrowed, fiction, chicklit

This book was just all right for me. I'm not a fan of books that have socialites as the main character, because I often find their world shallow. I also had a hard time believing that anyone would seriously call someone by the nickname "Lipstick" throughout the entire book. The plot and characters became better as I continued to read it, so I'm glad I stuck through it.

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Jul 23, 2009 Alexis rated it 4 of 5 stars

Apart from the Swedish descent's character's last name being spelled Karllsen...(should be Karlsson--hello, Danish is "-sen" Swedish is "-sson". Someone dropped the ball on the research there. Sorry off my "-sson", soapbox now!)...it was the normal path of life is messed up, life takes some crazy turns, life becomes perfect. Predictable, but wonderful piece of chick lit.

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About Paula Froelich

Paula Froelich is the New York Times best-selling author of the debut novel, “Mercury In Retrograde.” She is best known in New York for being the deputy editor of the New York Post’s gossip column, Page Six, where she worked for ten years until June, 2009. She was also a correspondent for “Entertainment Tonight” and “The Insider” from 2002 to 2006 and has appeared as a guest on “The View,” “Real T...more

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