Very Important People

Very Important People was written before the coronavirus pandemic, but Covid-19 makes it more relevant. Lockdown has widened inequality as poorer households lose jobs and rely on their savings. Meanwhile, the rich are getting richer, leading to pent up demand for parties, girls and bottle trains among those who have already missed a season of it. ---Ollie Williams, Forbes Enlightening. . . . A fascinating glimpse into life behind the velvet rope. ---Matthew Partridge, Money Week One of Amazon's Best Books of 2020 in Business and Leadership The most colourful investigation into nightlife and gender politics since Gloria Steinem went incognito as a Playboy Bunny in 1963. ---Mark Smith, The Times Riveting. . . . Mears is an excellent storyteller, resulting in a book that's well-informed and critical but also animated and engaging. * Tatler * Very Important People depicts a complex world of exchange and exploitation, and warrants praise for doing so without passing predictable moral judgement. More than offering a mere window into the exotic lives of others, Ashley Mears emphasizes themes that should resonate with us all: the labour of marginalized others that lurks behind so much status-seeking consumption, the risks of conflating work with fun and friendship, and the sad fact that 'girl power' remains as oxymoronic as ever. ---Alice Bloch, Times Literary Supplement Riveting. . . . The results of her investigation are astonishing. Mears has amassed pages of enthralling, richly human testimony. . . . The anecdotes are hugely entertaining, in a throw-up-in-your-mouth way. . . . Mears's thesis-that nightclubs aren't exceptions to 'real life,' but a distilled, brutal caricature of it-gathers strength as the details accumulate. . . . Elegantly written and genuinely page-turning, with revelations about life that go far beyond nightclubs. ---Iona McLaren, Daily Telegraph Compelling, vivid and curiously poignant. . . . Very Important People succeeds in exposing the intriguing and often distressing realities of a culture whose values seem both alien and unpleasantly persistent. ---Lisa Hilton, The Critic Mears is a very good reporter. . . . A fascinating read. ---Lynn Barber, The Spectator Mears takes her readers inside the exclusive global nightclub and party circuit, from New York City to Miami and Saint-Tropez, in order to reveal a world constituted by spectacular displays of wealth. ---Laurie Taylor, BBC Radio 4, Thinking Allowed