Book Review & Giveaway: The Partner Track

By Jami Deise

**Giveaway is now closed**

Several years ago, as an editor of Diversity and the Bar magazine (published by the Minority Corporate Counsel Association), I worked on an article analyzing the law schools attended by partners at the country’s largest law firms. The research showed that while white male partners had attended schools of a variety of quality, minority partners had almost all come from the top law schools in the country – Harvard, Yale, Columbia. To me, this showed that a minority lawyer needed to be the best of the best to achieve partnership, while white men were able to take many different paths to the top. A white man with whom I discussed the article saw things completely differently: “It’s affirmative action,” he sneered. “Those law schools are so desperate for minorities, they’re shoo-ins. Minorities don’t go to those other law schools.”

That is what 21st century racism sounds like.

During the period of time when I was reading Helen Wan’s compelling debut novel The Partner Track, a brouhaha exploded on Twitter under the hash tag “#SolidarityIsForWhiteWomen.” Used primarily by African-American feminists, these tweets detailed how the issues white women fought for ignored the concerns of women of color. Indeed, when I raised my hand to review this novel, I assumed it was about a woman juggling marriage and children while working for the law firm brass ring. In other words, a typical white woman “Lean In” issue.

Instead, Wan’s novel gave me a first person look at the daily slights endured by a brilliant, hard-working (and single without children) Asian-American female lawyer. Ingrid Yung is an eighth-year associate up for partnership at a major New York law firm. Specializing in mergers & acquisitions, she’s personally tapped to lead an important deal for one of the firm’s largest clients. Her work could make or break her career. But at the same time, she’s “encouraged” to participate on the firm’s new diversity committee, and babysit a new paralegal who’s also the son of another major client. As she works her butt off, Ingrid is assured she’s a shoo-in for partner – after all, all the other minority women left a long time ago.

While Ingrid is occasionally forced to deal with out-and-out racism – catcalls on the street that turn into derogatory racist comments – mostly she deals with the casual boys’ network that never actively seeks to shut out minorities and women (as an Asian woman, Ingrid is a “two-fer”), but never seems to notice that when they hire their friends’ sons or only golf with men who played for their high school, they end up leaving out people who don’t look like them.

Even so, Ingrid keeps her head down and her nose to the grindstone. She still believes that she who works hardest will be ultimately successful. Her biggest downfall is her inability to grasp that those around her are not playing by the same rules.

The Partner Track is written in first person, which allows the reader to experience exactly what Ingrid does and feel how she feels. Never strident nor shrill, Ingrid reacts in the moment and then tries to move on. The reader never feels that Ingrid might be overreacting or judging others too harshly. At the same time, she gives other characters enough of a voice that the reader is able to see how even those who have benefitted from the boys’ network might also be trapped by it. (While the novel is engaging and accessible even to someone who earned a C in her journalism law class, its personal treatment of important national corporate issues make me think that The Partner Track will, in a few years, be required law school reading. Or at least for law firm diversity managers.)

Somehow, author Wan managed to write this stunning novel while working as an associate general counsel for Time, Inc. (although apparently it took her a decade.) Her grasp of plot and character seem much more advanced than is typically found in a debut novel. I hope it doesn’t take her another ten years to write her second.

Thank to Wunderkind PR for the book in exchange for an honest review. They have THREE copies for some lucky US readers.

How to win:
Tell us if anyone ever made an assumption about you and how you proved them wrong. (Or if you made an assumption about someone else and how they proved you wrong.)

One entry per person.

Please include your e-mail address or another way to reach you if you win. Entries without contact information will NOT be counted.

US only. Giveaway ends September 24th at midnight EST.

BookTrib is also giving away copies of this novel through September 20th. (US/Canada)


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