Sellevision: A Novel | 
| Author: Augusten Burroughs
Publisher: Picador
Category: Book
List Price: $13.00
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Avg. Customer Rating:  133 reviews
Sales Rank: 8145
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 240
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 8.2 x 5.4 x 0.7
ISBN: 0312422288
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.6
EAN: 9780312422288
ASIN: 0312422288
Publication Date: June 1, 2003
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| Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.com
Light and funny, with a bitter aftertaste, the action of Sellevision takes place behind the scenes (and on the set) of a successful television shopping network, where a feminine role model, Peggy Jean Smythe, the married, Christian mother of three, begins receiving suspicious e-mail from a viewer who insists that Peggy's hairy earlobe is obscuring her presentation of jewelry during the broadcast. When Peggy fails to respond to the e-mail, but silently waxes her lobe, the cruel notes escalate, until Peggy believes herself to be suffering from a hormonal crisis that has given her a mustache, a gruff voice, and the manner of a lumberjack. Meanwhile, one of her cohosts, Max Andrews, has been fired for accidentally exposing himself during a children's special, and learns just how undesirable a commodity a penis-baring ex-Sellevision host can be on the job market. The book is an unusually smooth read for a first novel, with six or seven truly inspired lines. --Regina Marler
Product Description
Darkly funny and gleefully mean-spirited, Sellevision explores greed, obsession and third tier celebrity, in the world of a fictional home shopping network.
Welcome to the troubled world of Sellevision, America’s premier retail broadcasting network. When Max Andrews, the much-loved and handsome (lonely and gay) host of “Slumber Sunday Sundown” accidentally exposes himself in front of twenty million kids and their parents during a “Toys for Tots” segment, Sellevision faces its first big scandal. As Max fails to find a job in television, another host, the popular and perky Peggy Jean Smythe is receiving sinister emails about her appearance from a stalker. Popping pills and drinking heavily, she fails to notice that her husband is spending a lot of time with the very young babysitter who lives next door. Then there’s Leigh, whose affair with Sellevision boss Howard Toast is going nowhere, until she exposes him on air; and Bebe, Sellevision’s star host, who finds Mr. Right through the Internet--if she can just stop her shopping addiction from taking over.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 128 more reviews...
 Would have made a better script June 30, 2008
I like this author, and the book has a great premise. Unfortunately, I don't think the author cared enough about them to ever bring them to life. The situations in this book are quite hilarious -- and they would work really well as a popcorn movie. It's just not a book.
Sellevision June 4, 2008
Sellevision, By Augusten Borroughs, is sadly dissapointing. It is predictible and childish. By neglecting to develop some of the characters the depth of the main character is limited. This is the story of Peggy Jean, the second leading host on the home shopping network, Sellevision. Peggy Jean is plagued by a stalker, and then devoleps a drug addiction. Lame. Another character, Max, has an embarrassing moment reminiscent of that is broadcast live on national television and is forced to leave his job at Sellevision. To handle Max's struggle to get a new job, Burroughs resorts to a gay cliche in a plot riddled with Cliches. turns to gay porn. Another character, Leigh, has an affair with the boss at Sellevision, and struggles to obtain his love. Bebe, the lead host on Sellevision, is very lonely, and channels this abandonment through shopping. She starts to go on a wide array of dates through the internet.
The thing that really bothered me in Sellevision, is that, the gay man conquered the least. In most books I read, the homosexual man is put down. I thought this would be different from a gay author. I know the world can be more difficult for gay men, but I thought that possibly, for once, the gay man would triumph. All the characters in the book make great accomplishments, While Max struggles to keep hold of his life.
 Entertaining June 3, 2008
Enjoyable and easy to read, though I didn't find it hilarious like some of the other reviews. Found some of the characters to be quite true to life, and reflected some of the horror of TV hosts that we are subjected to on these shopping networks!
 Reads like a college-level novel try May 19, 2008
First, let me say that Augusten Burroughs is one of my favorite authors overall. But this book just did not work. I kept waiting for it to get better, and wanted to throw it across the room when I finally finished it. I wanted my money back. More than that, I wanted my life back -- the time I'd wasted reading this. The characters are despicable and unlikeable. I checked into the order of his work, and found that he'd actually written this BEFORE "Running With Scissors." In my opinion, each book he's written has gotten consistently stronger. Running With Scissors was good, but a bit uneven in pacing and dragged at times. "Dry" was perfection. "Magical Thinking" was outstanding as well. I feel like Burroughs' talents have evolved as a writer, and Sellevision was a sophomoric effort. I think they are riding on his other successes to get this published and sold now. Or at least that's what I thought until I saw so many positive reviews for the book. Still, do know that his other books are ALL memoirs and this is fiction, and it just doesn't have the same voice at all. The whole thing felt very forced to me.
Crude and Wickedly Funny May 5, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This, Augusten Burroughs's first book, is sort of a combination soap opera and farce. It's fast moving, irreverent in the extreme, and very funny. It's also a bit crude at times, which I mention simply as a point of information, not as a criticism.
When I mention farce, I automatically think of P.G. Wodehouse, against whose works all farce must, I think, be measured. Sellevision measures up reasonably well. Burroughs doesn't have Wodehouse's gift for language, but, then who does? Four stars instead of five because the plot seems a bit too contrived and arbitrary for my taste, but definitely worth a read.
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