I left my job at the TV network to go to graduate school, during which time I wrote a novel about a Hollywood assistant and the slippery slope of complicity. Recommended if you’re looking for something like Devil Wears Prada, not too deep but a nice entry into further reading.

Everyone likes to speak loudly and frequently about how committed they are to diversity and inclusion in the workplace and on screen. I thought the project had a lot of promise and wanted to see if there was anything I could do to push it forward.behind the glitter and the justice, everyone is tarnished and compromised - including even our narrator. Maybe that’s the fun of it – sitting on the couch, internally/externally willing someone to spot the creep(s). I wanted to know what the characters were feeling and what their next move was going to be and I think that was done really well. This read like The Devil Wears Prada set in Hollywood, as she starts off thinking that this is a job to tide her over, get her mother to stop bugging her and then she’ll get a real job.

Ambition bites back in Isabel Kaplan's Not Safe For Work, a novel that hits close to a few recent news events .Though I’m passed that in my life now, this book brought back all the feelings of realising that the world is hard, you have no idea what you’re doing and you question everything you thought you knew about the people in your life.

So visceral is the narrator's voice that every time I opened the book it felt like sliding into uncomfortable heels. But certain gendered instincts – people pleasing, playing peacemaker, considering another person’s comfort a precondition for my own – served me well.It was woven through the main plotline and definitely added depth to the origins of her insecurities and vulnerability. She was needy, unreasonable and insistent on maintaining a strong dependency between herself and her daughter. People previously unaware of the terms “implicit bias” and “microaggressions” have now attended training sessions about them and know that they are bad. When rumours of an assault start to circle the office, and your close friend confesses her own disturbing experience, you know there is plenty to gain from staying silent.

I get the impression it was supposed to be more hard hitting than it was, and it didn’t really say more than we already know. Quickly becoming embroiled in the day to day discussions, power struggles and gossip in her office, she meets a pretty astonishing array of dreadful people, classic LA/Hollywood characters. Otherwise, too many people will remain silent because they will decide it’s not worth the discomfort and emotional fallout of making a fuss about a minor comment. But the truth is that I feel most comfortable and empowered on the page, expressing myself at a safe distance and after extended reflection. It is widely understood that you are not to grope or make sexual advances on your employees, and that if you do so, you may face consequences.So when you land a job in television, you're ready for anything: pulling all-nighters, leaning on your powerful mother's contacts, keeping your boss happy whatever - and whoever - the cost.