Ditched by Dr. Right

Book excerpt: In witty slice-of-life vignettes and laugh-out-loud cultural riffs, Elizabeth Warner shares her divinely demented view of the world. Raised by a mild-mannered psychiatrist father and a slightly off-kilter mother, Warner opted out of the life that awaited the youth of WASP heaven (aka Philadelphia’s Main Line)–that is, to be “typically weaned, whelped, and privately schooled, whereupon you move on to the roost-and-spawn phase.” Yet no matter how far afield she ventures–to New York to become a master junk-mail marketer or to L.A. to do a little acting–Warner can’t help but feel that sometimes she’s getting nowhere fast on “some kind of Protestant monorail to doom.” Whether she’s spelling out the invisible word “help” on a guy’s shoulder blades during unfulfilling sex, getting out of jury duty by smearing herself with soy sauce, or convincing her mother that the words “career girl” are not her death knell, Warner proves that sometimes it doesn’t matter where you go in life–just as long as you’ve got a killer punch line.