The World's Worst Assistant
Ratings13
Average rating3.3
15
Ratings13
Average rating3.3
***An Instant New York Times Bestseller*** From Conan O’Brien’s longtime assistant and cohost of his podcast, Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend, a completely hilarious and irreverent how-to guide for becoming a terrible, yet unfireable employee, spilling her trade secrets for minimizing effort while maximizing the rewards. Sona Movsesian didn’t wake up one day and decide to become the World’s Worst Assistant. Achieving such greatness is a gradual process--one that starts with long hours and hard work before it eventually descends into sneaking low-dosage edibles into your lunch and napping on your boss’s couch. With a foreword from Conan O’Brien, The World’s Worst Assistant is populated with hysterical black-and-white illustrations, comics, and more. It’s a mixture of how-tos (like How to Nap at Work and How to Watch TV at Your Desk), tips for becoming untouchable (like memorizing social security and credit card numbers and endearing yourself to friends and family), and incredible personal stories from Sona’s twelve years spent working for Conan that put their adorable closeness and professional dysfunction on display. In these pages, Sona will explain her descent from eager, hard-working, ambitious, detail-orientated assistant to self-awarded title-holder for the worst in history. This book is irresistible fun you’ll want to give to every young professional in your life. For readers of heartfelt humor like that of Phoebe Robinson and Colin Jost, The World’s Worst Assistant is a chance for fans, viewers, and listeners of Conan’s shows and podcast to fall in love with Sona and Conan all over again.
Reviews with the most likes.
Fans of Conan (of which I am), will know of Sona by extension. Over the last decade, she's become a semi-familiar face, and now voice, joining the gangly walkaround muppet on his adventures.
Throughout the course of this book, Sona details her side of many stories familiar to Conan viewers (the Armenia trip, the Gigolos mug, Conan picking on her like a big brother), and with an abundance of self-effacing charm and humor, she lets you in on the secrets of being mediocre at her job and managing to maintain her position as Conan's majordomo.
It's competently written, but at a very minimal level, much like everything else Sona seems to do. It's not some sort of flowery, languid prose that will woo you or excite you, but it conveys what it needs to, and there are a few good zingers and jokes thrown in for good measure.
All in all–if you're not a fan of the show, you won't like this book. If you are a fan, you'll find some good humor in it. If you were hoping for some deep, revelatory backstory, you're not going to find it here. Sona really doesn't shed any new light on anything that wasn't already known, but it's a fun, fast read nonetheless.
