![Whistleblower: My Journey to Silicon Valley and Fight for Justice at Uber by [Fowler, Susan]](https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51JGt0PjMkL._SY346_.jpg)
I'd been looking forward to reading this ever since Susan Fowler joined the staff at the New York Times - a book couldn't have been far behind. She is clearly a gifted writer with a special story to tell, after her revelations about workplace culture at Uber were published 3 years ago to great impact.
Whistleblower sits at the intersection of two strands of books about Silicon Valley that are quite popular today. The first is The Mistreatment Memoir, such as Ellen Pao's Reset or Anna Wiener's Uncanny Valley. These memoirs feature the author's lived experience, with plenty of personal details woven in.
These personal details on Fowler's upbringing and her path leading up to Uber are very strong. We empathize with the small town girl. We feel the frustrations build. We see how a discrimination incident at UPenn is truly a "learning opportunity" (words used by people who were meant to help but end up hurting her) - she now knows how to handle the issues at Uber in a way that eventually puts her in control.
The second strand of popular SV books is The "Stumbling Star" Investigation, with John Carreyrou's Bad Blood or Mike Isaac's Super Pumped as examples. Fowler's account was so culturally impactful because it relates to Uber, the pacesetter of the more recent herd of unicorns. While journalists wrote pieces critical of Uber long before Fowler's post, this was one of the first times when the call came from inside the house. Like a good journalist should, she wrote her blog in a matter-of-fact tone that enhanced its credibility. The book adds more depth of emotion to the account but Fowler never gets carried away.
There are of course areas where I'm left wanting. Whistleblower suffers from that common affliction of memoirs where the author is a bit "too flawless": her interests too pure, even her hesitations more than understandable. Fowler also left some threads open, especially about her family, which receded into the distance as soon as she moved to the Bay. She got me invested at the start, but then there is scant mention of anyone but her husband.
In all though, a fascinating, pleasant read about resilience, growth, going up against the big guys and prevailing.
Review
Praise for Whistleblower:
“Sharp and engrossing . . . A powerful illustration of the obstacles our society continues to throw up in the paths of ambitious young women, and the ways that institutions still protect and enable badly behaving men.”
—The New York Times Book Review
“This is not just a book for people interested in the culture of Silicon Valley. Like all the best books, it delivers the reader into a fully drawn world she may never have imagined . . . At times it reads like a spy thriller, at others like a satire of what might happen when corporate overlords go unchecked . . . It is not just a book about harassment or inequality; it is the story of a woman navigating a world that would rather not deal with her . . . The details around her experience at Uber are the sizzle; Fowler’s own story is the steak. She’s an unlikely hero, unconnected, anachronistic and almost irritatingly admirable, a woman blessed with unending curiosity and an exceptional facility to learn. That she became a whistle-blower and a pioneer of a social movement almost seems inevitable once you get to know her. Uber should have seen her coming.”
—San Francisco Chronicle
“Gut-wrenching . . . An intimate first-person account that doubles as a warning . . . [Whistleblower is] the story of how Fowler’s life was shaped by her time at Uber—but a story, too, of her fight for a life that would not succumb to the company’s influence . . . Fowler’s story—her full story—is the indictment. That is what gives Whistleblower its power.”
—The Atlantic
“It’s easy to focus on what happened to Fowler . . . But in her new memoir, Fowler makes a dedicated plea for you to focus, instead, on what she did about it . . . [Whistleblower] does provide more eyebrow-raising details about just how hostile and chaotic Uber's workplace was. But Fowler is much more interested in unpacking how—and why—she responded by going public . . . This memoir is a bit of a how-to book, too, with some take-home lessons for anyone discouraged by a hostile workplace.”
—NPR.org
“[Whistleblower] broadens the view beyond Uber, offering a clear-eyed exploration of what workplace sexual discrimination looks like, why it’s so toxic and how it destroys ambitions, careers and lives.”
—HuffPost
“There’s a good case that Uber would still have its notoriously toxic workplace culture were it not for Susan Fowler . . . Whistleblower fills us in on how junior white-collar employees struggled to keep the culture [the CEO] instilled from threatening their sanity, and how one of them was eventually able to tear it down.”
—Slate
“Whistleblower . . . promises to start a new conflagration of its own. This time, the system being indicted is not Uber, or even Silicon Valley more broadly, but the entire American patriarchy...American society did its very best to prevent her from succeeding. Her life, and this book, represents her triumph over almost inconceivable odds.”
—Axios
“Sharp and engrossing . . . A powerful illustration of the obstacles our society continues to throw up in the paths of ambitious young women, and the ways that institutions still protect and enable badly behaving men.”
—The New York Times Book Review
“This is not just a book for people interested in the culture of Silicon Valley. Like all the best books, it delivers the reader into a fully drawn world she may never have imagined . . . At times it reads like a spy thriller, at others like a satire of what might happen when corporate overlords go unchecked . . . It is not just a book about harassment or inequality; it is the story of a woman navigating a world that would rather not deal with her . . . The details around her experience at Uber are the sizzle; Fowler’s own story is the steak. She’s an unlikely hero, unconnected, anachronistic and almost irritatingly admirable, a woman blessed with unending curiosity and an exceptional facility to learn. That she became a whistle-blower and a pioneer of a social movement almost seems inevitable once you get to know her. Uber should have seen her coming.”
—San Francisco Chronicle
“Gut-wrenching . . . An intimate first-person account that doubles as a warning . . . [Whistleblower is] the story of how Fowler’s life was shaped by her time at Uber—but a story, too, of her fight for a life that would not succumb to the company’s influence . . . Fowler’s story—her full story—is the indictment. That is what gives Whistleblower its power.”
—The Atlantic
“It’s easy to focus on what happened to Fowler . . . But in her new memoir, Fowler makes a dedicated plea for you to focus, instead, on what she did about it . . . [Whistleblower] does provide more eyebrow-raising details about just how hostile and chaotic Uber's workplace was. But Fowler is much more interested in unpacking how—and why—she responded by going public . . . This memoir is a bit of a how-to book, too, with some take-home lessons for anyone discouraged by a hostile workplace.”
—NPR.org
“[Whistleblower] broadens the view beyond Uber, offering a clear-eyed exploration of what workplace sexual discrimination looks like, why it’s so toxic and how it destroys ambitions, careers and lives.”
—HuffPost
“There’s a good case that Uber would still have its notoriously toxic workplace culture were it not for Susan Fowler . . . Whistleblower fills us in on how junior white-collar employees struggled to keep the culture [the CEO] instilled from threatening their sanity, and how one of them was eventually able to tear it down.”
—Slate
“Whistleblower . . . promises to start a new conflagration of its own. This time, the system being indicted is not Uber, or even Silicon Valley more broadly, but the entire American patriarchy...American society did its very best to prevent her from succeeding. Her life, and this book, represents her triumph over almost inconceivable odds.”
—Axios
About the Author
The technology op-ed editor at The New York Times, Susan Fowler has been named a "Person of the Year" by Time, The Financial Times, and the Webby Awards, and has appeared on Fortune's "40 under 40" list, Vanity Fair's New Establishment List, Marie Claire's New Guard List, the Bloomberg 50, the Upstart 50, the Recode 100, and more. She is the author of a book on computer programming that has been implemented by companies across Silicon Valley.
