Friday, June 16, 2023

Kim Fashions A Career


     Kim Merriman has just completed her second year of college when her father has a sudden stroke. In order to help him take time to recover Kim leaves school temporarily to get a job. Although she dreams of working as a buyer at department store the only offer she receives is as a stockroom girl. She accepts the job planning to quickly work her way up to the position she wants.

    Kim soon makes friends with her fellow coworkers including Francesca, a beautiful girls who dreams of being a model, and Dave, a night school attendee who is full of wisdom and good advice. Kim is fascinated by the department store and begins learning the ins and outs but despite her devotion to her job she can't help but miss college. Especially when she goes on dates with her sorta-boyfriend Gary who is always caught up in college/fraternity events. 

    Kim only plans on missing a semester of school but when her father decides to open an art gallery instead of going back to work Kim signs on to her job full time. Dave encourages Kim to attend night school but Kim insists she wants to go to "real college", especially since Annette, her rival for Gary's heart, has just transferred to Gary's school.

    Kim, eager to get ahead, propositions Melva Dorn, the fashion buyer, for a position as her assistant. Her boldness pays off and she gets a part time position as her assistant. Kim uses this opportunity to show off her fashion skills and learns some hard lessons about speaking up.

    When Christmas time comes around Kim attends a party at Gary's fraternity. When she learns the party-goers intend to steal Christmas displays from the department stores Kim realizes how much she has outgrown her old crowd and Gary. She decides to enroll in night school and give her heart to Dave.

- Kim is so unlikeable! She is spoiled, snobby, and self centered. She also seems impossible to get along with yet she thinks it's everyone else's fault.

- Kim is shocked anytime a coworker uses their employee discount to buy something for a friend and even refers to Cheri as "committing a crime" when she does it.

- It ended very abruptly. Kim decides to go to night school and realizes she likes Dave on the last pages. I thought the story was building up to Kim actually going to night school where she would do actual personal growth so when it ended without that happening it was very disappointing and made the book feel like a build up to nothing.

(I read this book on Archive.org via their lending library which is where the image comes from.)

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