E (novel)

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e
Beaumont's e.jpg
First edition
Author Matt Beaumont
LanguageEnglish
Publisher HarperCollins
Publication date
2000,
Publication placeUnited Kingdom
Media typePrint (Paperback original)
Pages342 pp
ISBN 978-0-00-710068-2
OCLC 44484266

e (originally subtitled The Novel of Liars, Lunch and Lost Knickers) is a comic novel by Matt Beaumont first published in 2000. Written in the epistolary tradition, it consists entirely of e-mails written between the employees of an advertising agency and some of their business partners. Thus, the novel is a multiple-perspective narrative where events are seen through the eyes of various people working for the agency, from temp to CEO. e centres on corporate business structures, leadership, creativity, headhunting for and firing people to keep up appearances, work efficiency, business ethics, and all kinds of human weaknesses which stall progress by having employees waste their time and energy on unimportant things and which eventually prevent success.

Contents

Beaumont worked as a copywriter himself before embarking on a literary career; e was his debut novel.

Plot summary

e takes place in January 2000, the beginning of the new millennium, inside the London office of the prominent international advertising agency Miller Shanks. Two major projects are under way: the shooting, on location in Mauritius, of a commercial for a porn channel; and preparations for a sales pitch, with Coca-Cola as the company's prospective client.

While the Coca-Cola advertising campaign is supposed to be kept confidential, David Crutton, the chief executive officer, inadvertently sends carbon copies of every single one of his e-mails to the Helsinki office of Miller Shanks due to his computer illiteracy. Simon Horne, the creative director, steals the "original" idea on which the Coca-Cola campaign is based from two recent college graduates who are looking for work, and does not believe that his theft will be discovered. In the end he is found out, but although the campaign is patched up at the last minute with the help of the Helsinki office, Coca-Cola decides not to award their advertising account to Miller Shanks after one of their top level managers watches a secretly filmed video on the Internet showing Horne in his office having sex with a ladyboy, uploaded thanks to the efforts of copywriter Liam O'Keefe, who filmed it all taking place, and his friend and colleague art director Brett Topowlski.

The shooting in Mauritius goes terribly wrong already during the flight to the island when the breast implants of one of the four models hired to appear in the video explode. Shortly afterwards, yet another model drops out due to hyperthermia, facts which force the creative team to continually rewrite the script. Bad weather makes filming impossible for a couple of days, but the last straw is an alleged sexual attack by the company's male client ("a fat lech") on television presenter Gloria Hunniford, who happens to be staying at the same hotel together with a BBC crew to film a holiday show. Miller Shanks encounter further complications when loose talk at the hotel bar by Topowlski and Vince Douglas, the two art directors for the commercial, triggers a headline in The Sun about the "Hunniford Affair".

Subplots revolve around the frantic attempts of office manager Ken Perry to uphold order in the building; the ongoing love affair between O'Keefe and Lorraine Pallister; a not even half-hearted suicide attempt by Susi Judge-Davis, devoted personal assistant to Simon Horne and Simon Horne alone; and Nigel 'Nige' Godley's failed endeavours to be recognized as both a good chum and a loyal workaholic.

Characters

Reviews

According to the author's web site, e "caused something of a stir on its publication, not least in London advertising circles where the debate centred around who the book's characters were based on. It went on to become a bestseller in several countries."

For some time, Miller Shanks even had their own (fictitious) web site, www.millershanks.com (no longer active) for readers to browse through.

Beaumont also wrote a short sequel to the novel, The e Before Christmas (2000), and a complete sequel entitled e Squared (2010) incorporating text messaging content alongside emails.

See also

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