When Wade Rouse—a rural, public school graduate who grew up more Hee Haw than Dynasty—was hired as the director of publicity at the prestigious Tate Academy, he quickly discovered his real job was to make a few of the very pretty, very rich, very mean mommies of the elite students happy.
Enter former Tate beauty queen and sports star Katherine Isabelle Ludington—Kitsy to her friends—who went to an Ivy, married an Ivy, and made a lot of money. Now, she is Wade’s VIP volunteer and a perfectly coiffed nightmare.
In between designing Louis Vuitton–inspired reunion invitations, dressing as Ronald Reagan for Halloween, and surviving surprise Botox parties, Wade tries to tame Kitsy and her pink Lilly Pulitzer–clad posse while reclaiming his self-esteem.
Following a year in the life of the super rich and super spoiled, Confessions of a Prep School Mommy Handler is hilarious, heartbreaking, and deliciously catty.
Some jobs are decidedly unenviable, but Rouse may have the most unenviable of all: mommy handler. OK, his real title is "director of public relations" for a tony prep school (renamed Tate Academy here). But the job, at its core, is to deal with the very rich, very demanding, very unkind mothers of the school's so-very-fabulous students. His memoir opens during carpool-lane duty, where Wade is accosted by Kitsy Ludington, who becomes his nemesis of the year. Kitsy is the supreme Mean Mommy, and Wade's tales of his misadventures with her are hilarious. Take, for example, the time he tried to drop off an invitation to her home only to find he had stumbled into a Botox party with a Doogie Howser–like "doctor" at the helm. Even as Wade makes strides at understanding what makes these ladies act the way they do, he finds himself the target of their insecurities—and it doesn't end pretty. But Wade's irreverent look at his career at Tate is laugh-out-loud funny and full of charm, candor, and a boatload of cattiness. Wilkens, Mary Frances
Wade Rouse is the "laugh-out-loud-funny" (NBC's Today Show), "wise, witty, wicked" (USA Today), "engagingly funny memoirist" (Chicago Tribune) who is a "hybrid of "David Sedaris and Dave Barry" (Library Journal) and "Erma Bombeck's lovechild" (Advocate). Rouse "beautifully combines humor and pathos" (Out Magazine), and has quickly established himself as "an original writer and impressive new voice" (The Washington Post) whose "combination of honest emotion and evocative prose is destined to be a hit!" (St. Louis Post-Dispatch). In short, Wade Rouse is "hilarious, riotously funny, catty, and an absolute delight!" (Christian Science Monitor)
Wade Rouse is the author of four, critically-acclaimed memoirs, including America's Boy (Dutton/2006), Confessions of A Prep School Mommy Handler (Harmony/2007), and the bestsellers, At Least in the City Someone Would Hear Me Scream: Misadventures in Search of the Simple Life (Harmony/2009), and It's All Relative: A Memoir of Two Families, Three Dogs, 34 Holidays and 50 Boxes of Wine (Crown/2011). He is also the creator and editor of the upcoming, humorous dog anthology, I'm Not the Biggest Bitch in This Relationship: Hilarious, Heartwarming Tales about Man's Best Friends by America's Favorite Humorists (NAL/2011), which features a foreword by Chelsea Handler and her dog, Chunk.
The IndieBound bestselling It's All Relative: A Memoir of Two Families, Three Dogs, 34 Holidays and 50 Boxes of Wine asks and attempts to answer the question, "How come the only thing my family tree grows is nuts?", in blisteringly funny detail. The book deals with America's obsession with picture-perfect holidays and celebrates Rouse's imperfect family--a chatty yet loving mother, an eccentric engineer of a father, a marvelously Martha Stewart-esque partner, a garage-sale obsessed set of in-laws, and an oddball collection of relatives--through the yearly celebrations that bring out the very best in our nearest and dearest. Rouse paints a funny, sad, poignant, and outlandish portrait of an all too typical family that will have you appreciating or bemoaning your own. "It's rare to find a book that is both funny and mean, family-intensive and gay-friendly, gossipy and sweet. It's All Relative is all of the above!" Minneapolis Star-Tribune
At Least in the City Someone Would Hear Me Scream chronicles the misadventures of two neurotic urbanites who quit their jobs, and leave the city, cable, couture and consumerism behind in order to move to the Michigan woods and recreate a modern-day Walden. At Least in the City Someone Would Hear Me Scream was a national bestseller, 2009 Best Book of the Year by B&N, and named a Must-Read by NBC's Today Show, Detroit Free-Press, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, St. Petersburg Times, Out, MetroSource Magazine, Chicago Magazine, Chicago Public Radio, Michigan Public Radio, St. Louis Magazine, Frontiers Magazine, among others.
Rouse's first memoir, America's Boy, which chronicles his life growing up gay in the Ozarks thanks to the unconditional love from an unconventional family, was named by Border's as a Best Book (Literary Memoir) of 2006, "A Best Book of 2006" by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. a 2006 BookSense selection by the nation's independent booksellers, an inaugural "Rainbow" pick for GLBT young readers by the American Library Association, and a PFLAG "Required Read". The American Library Association recently named it as one of the top 100 GLBT books.
His second memoir, Confessions of A Prep School Mommy Handler, about his tenure as PR director at an elite prep school where he quickly learns his "real job" is to cater to a Lilly Pulitzer-clad clique of "Mean Mommies," was selected by both Barnes & Noble and Target as a Breakout Bestseller, and hailed as "funny" by Entertainment Weekly. The memoir is about job discrimination and the incredible pressures facing faculty, students and parents today.
I'm Not the Biggest Bitch in This Relationship features essays by some of America's favorite funny writers and comics, including Chelsea Handler, Jen Lancaster, Laurie Notaro, Bruce Cameron, Jane Green, Stephanie Klein, Beth Harbison, Alec Mapa, Jeff Marx (Tony winning creator of Avenue Q), Rita Mae Brown, Jill Conner Browne and many others. A portion of the book's proceeds will benefit The Humane Society of the United States.
Rouse was a contributor to the humorous anthology on working in retail, The Customer Is Always Wrong: The Retail Chronicles (Counterpoint-Soft Skull Press). Rouse's essay on working at Sears after years of wearing Husky's was selected to kick off the collection.
Rouse is a contributing humor columnist for Metrosource magazine, and TheBeachCoast.com, and a regular contributor to Michigan Public Radio. His essays and articles have appeared in numerous national magazines and online publications, including Forbes.com, which reaches nearly 10 million readers, as well as on CBC Radio One's popular "Definitely Not the Opera" in Canada and Chicago Public Radio. He has lectured and taught writing seminars around the country, from The Chicago Public Library to the Erma Bombeck Humor Writers Workshop. Rouse is represented by the Random House Speakers Bureau - alongside such luminaries as Ken Burns, Jay McInerney, Richard Russo, Jane Smiley, Gay Talese, Roy Blount Jr., and Lisa See - and is available for select readings and lectures. To inquire about a possible appearance, please visit www.rhspeakers.com or call 212-572-2013.
Rouse's personalized, intense and transformational writing retreats - which center on overcoming fears in one's life and one's writing - and provide insider advice on securing a literary agent and finding success as a fulltime author, have been credited by numerous writers for helping their manuscripts be published by mainstream publishers. For more, please visit www.WadesWriters.com.
He earned his B.A. in communications (with honors) from Drury College (now University) and his master's degree from Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism.
Rouse lives on the coast of Michigan, where - in between beach weather and blizzards - he writes memoirs and battles for bed space with his partner, Gary, and their beloved mutt, Mabel. Wade is a volunteer and fundraiser for Wishbone-Paws For A Cause, an animal shelter in Michigan, a member of HRC, and supporter of Hospice. He is a marathon runner, avid reader and movie/theatre buff, and addicted to fashion, hair, lip shimmer, reality TV and non-fat, triple shot white chocolate lattes. Wade is represented by literary agent Wendy Sherman of Wendy Sherman Associates in Manhattan, and the Random House Speakers' Bureau. For more, please visit www.WadeRouse.com www.WadesWriters.com (writing retreats & classes) www.rhspeakers.com
Not very original, no plot, no believable characters...I wouldn't really recommend it. This is a collection of short anecdotes arranged in chronological order and it all sounds so over the top and composite character-like.
If you really want to laugh about prep school mommies, read Acceptance by Susan Coll.
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This review is from: Confessions of a Prep School Mommy Handler: A Memoir (Hardcover)
On any given weekday morning, rain or shine, you could find Wade Rouse in the carpool lane of Tate Academy helping to direct traffic, usher kids into school and placate the concerns of parents. Rouse was not a crossing guard or even a teacher, but the director of publicity at the prestigious mid-western school.
In his latest memoir, CONFESSIONS OF A PREP SCHOOL MOMMY HANDLER, the author of AMERICA'S BOY recounts his life at the beck and call of a few of the super rich and snobby mothers of Tate students. While publicity is ostensibly his job at Tate, Rouse soon learns that his primary responsibility is handling overly involved and not very kind mommies. For him, the carpool lane comes to symbolize his demeaning work at the school.
Rouse is clever, funny and kind, but not to himself. His low self-esteem is attractive to the ladies he dubs "the mean mommies," especially to Katherine Isabelle Ludington, or "Kitsy." Kitsy, a Tate alum and the parent to young Tate student "Mitsy," decides to become deeply involved in both the major and minor happenings on the busy Tate calender. These are the events that Rouse is generally in charge of, and somehow, over the course of the year, he ends up being her assistant. Rouse is desperate to turn her down but is unable to do so. She humiliates him, manipulates him emotionally and buys him off with expensive gifts, yet he still wonders if she in fact may be his first adult female friend.
It is not necessary to have read Rouse's first memoir, in which he talks about his childhood and young adulthood, to fully understand where he is coming from in CONFESSIONS, but it does help a little. Rouse grew up in the rural south in an eccentric but caring family. He was gay, overweight and unpopular. Later he slimmed down, came out to his family and close friends, and found true love in his partner, Gary. But the insecure boy remained deep within him, and Kitsy and the other mean mommies knew how to bring him out. Over the course of the year, with some encouragement and self-realization, Rouse garners the strength to stand up to the injustices of the carpool lane.
While a memoir, this is far from a tell-all. Kitsy is a composite of several of the women Rouse knew at the university, but most of the time that fact is easy to overlook as he draws us into the world of Tate: SUVs, vacation homes, designer labels, expendable income, free time and lots of Lilly Pulitzer pink. Overall, Rouse is far kinder to his subjects than they ever were to him.
CONFESSIONS is funny and touching, and Rouse really hits his stride when he begins to explore why he stayed on at a job that made him miserable. Full of interesting characters and told by a genuinely good guy, this is a fun and thoughtful book that is not to be missed.
--- Reviewed by Sarah Rachel Egelman
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This review is from: Confessions of a Prep School Mommy Handler: A Memoir (Hardcover)
No doubt this tell all satire will sell out quickly in St. Louis where everyone
who attended "Tate" will be trying to assimilate the characters.
The book is well written, but the characterization is way over the top.
Perhaps I feel this way because I attended "Tate" for a dozen years.
Regardless, it is a delicious catty read not to be taken too seriously.
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