What do readers think of Help Wanted by Adelle Waldman? Write your own review.

Summary | Reviews | More Information | More Books

Help Wanted by Adelle Waldman

Help Wanted

A Novel

by Adelle Waldman

  • Critics' Consensus:
  • Readers' Rating:
  • Published:
  • Mar 2024, 288 pages
  • Rate this book

  • Buy This Book

About this book

Reviews

Page 3 of 4
There are currently 26 reader reviews for Help Wanted
Order Reviews by:

Write your own review!

Sandy P. (Chandler, AZ)

Big Box Drama
Great read! I enjoyed all of the characters; their quirks and their stories drew me in. It was fun and funny, sad and hopeful. This enjoyable book describes the drama of the ups and downs of mostly ordinary people working at an ordinary big box store. Recommended for book clubs.
Stephanie K. (Glendale, AZ)

Selling Retail Lives
In "Help Wanted," Adelle Waldman cuts close to the quick in detailing the struggles of retail workers in a big box store. As a former retailer myself, I identified with many of the emotions the characters were attempting to work through. This novel gave me a mild case of the "cold dreads" as I vicariously faced what each of the workers were facing in their personal and professional lives. It was a good take on the realities of life in retail, which at times can be like trying to run through mud.
Edie M. (Kennett Square, PA)

Help please
This book seemed extremely repetitive. Kind of like the life of an employee at a big box store! Makes you appreciate the people behind-the-scenes, who unload the trucks and stock the shelves! It doesn't happen by magic.
Elizabeth L. (Langhorne, PA)

Not for me
Unfortunately, I had a difficult time engaging in and relating to the characters and storyline of Help Wanted. Obviously working in retail is difficult yet I did not feel sympathetic to the workers' plight. I found the use of the names Big Will and Little Will distracting, and I was not interested in knowing how the story would end or what happened to the myriad of characters. There were a few moment of levity but not enough for me to recommend the book to others.
Jennie W. (Denver, CO)

Help Wanted
I wanted to like this book. It has a great premise about the inequalities in the workforce; rank-in-file versus management. However, there were so many characters with so many issues that it was hard to keep track of each character and their problems. The writing and the plot were flat and made it difficult to stay interested in the story..
Barbara T

A look into the retail industry
This book is about a group of people working in a large retail store and their job is to unload merchandise and stock shelves before the store opened for business. Their department manager was a self-absorbed woman who felt she was on the fast track to be promoted into the position being vacated by the Store Manager. The workers have a plan to get her promoted so she’ll be out of their department and her current position would be open to one of them. The basic theme of the story is to keep reading until we find out who gets promoted.
The author did a good job of giving the reader a glimpse of the treatment of employees in the corporate America setting. It didn’t matter the workers had to work 2 jobs to make ends meet. The store’s “pat on the back for a job well done” mentality was sufficient compensation.
All in all, I feel this could have been told in short story form and not 275 pages.
kate g

Too Many Characters, not enough Plot
This is a work place novel and there is a lot of detail about the work place. A general store, a step above Walmart, Town Square has its own drama, but the large number of characters made it hard for me to care about any of them. A little depressing as well, as all are struggling, except for the managers. Adelle Waldman has written a social critique, including important issues, especially racism and worker exploitation. It is too bad her prose and plot took away from her message.
Melissa C. (Saint Johns, FL)

Average at Best
I was disappointed that I didn't really enjoy this book. I was hopeful that I would, given the serious subject matter of work force inequality. But I found the characters flat and not very interesting. Oh well - can't love them all.

Read-Alikes

Top Picks

  • Book Jacket
    The House of Doors
    by Tan Twan Eng
    Every July, I take on the overly ambitious goal of reading all of the novels chosen as longlist ...
  • Book Jacket: The Puzzle Box
    The Puzzle Box
    by Danielle Trussoni
    During the tumultuous last days of the Tokugawa shogunate, a 17-year-old emperor known as Meiji ...
  • Book Jacket
    Something, Not Nothing
    by Sarah Leavitt
    In 2020, after a lifetime of struggling with increasingly ill health, Sarah Leavitt's partner, ...
  • Book Jacket
    A Haunting in Hialeah Gardens
    by Raul Palma
    Raul Palma's debut novel A Haunting in Hialeah Gardens introduces Hugo Contreras, who came to the ...

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket

    Pony Confidential
    by Christina Lynch

    In this whimsical mystery, a grumpy pony must clear his beloved human's name from a murder accusation.

Who Said...

We should have a great fewer disputes in the world if words were taken for what they are

Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

H I O the G

and be entered to win..

Your guide toexceptional          books

BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.