Snake Oil

A Novel

De: Kelsey Rae Dimberg

Narrado por: Kristen Sieh, Andi Arndt, Renata Friedman

A razor-sharp literary thriller about three women vying for power at a wellness startup, where the cost of ambition might be deadly

One woman’s elixir is another woman’s poison

Rhoda West is Silicon Valley’s favorite female CEO: the luminously charismatic founder of the fast-growing startup Radical, a wellness company whose core mission is the betterment of women’s lives. Rhoda’s Instagram page offers intimate glimpses of her personal life alongside promotions for the cult-status products developed in the Well, Radical’s secretive lab.

Dani Lang is a “quester,” as Rhoda calls her most avid followers. Dani found Radical at a low point in her life, and took an entry level job just to get in the door. When she volunteers to test a controversial new supplement, Dani wins an opportunity to rise in the company, even to work with Rhoda herself.

Cecelia Cole is a “quasher.” She grinds away at the Customer Worship queue, resenting the entitled customers, the woo-woo Radical jargon, and Rhoda’s smiling hypocrisy. Cecelia, who suffers from a miserable chronic illness, knows that the remedies Rhoda sells can’t cure real sickness.

Just as Rhoda announces another fundraising round that could turn Radical into a billion-dollar unicorn, an anonymous Twitter account begins spilling snarky gossip from inside the startup. Is Rhoda really the nurturing leader she presents to the world, or a fraud? Or is this just another case of a woman in business being punished for her strength and audacity?

Tensions rise and loyalties clash, then tragedy strikes during a company party. In the aftermath of what looks more and more like a crime, even the most faithful questers begin to wonder to what lengths Rhoda will go to protect her company.

Part binge-worthy suspense, part darkly comic skewering of startup culture, Snake Oil is a gripping exploration of ambition and authenticity, shining a revealing light on the wellness world.

©2024 Kelsey Rae Dimberg (P)2024 HarperCollins Publishers

Nonsense

Unlikable characters, narcissistic and unbelievable. Story was long and boring. Didn’t care what any of them did or said.

Ironically there’s no truth in advertising this

From the summary promising “razor sharp” writing with “binge worthy suspense” and “darkly comedic skewering of startup culture” I was expecting something like Nicole Kidman’s To Die For meets the
real life Theranos/Elizabeth Holmes blood testing debacle.

Instead, this was a long slog via the POVs of three unlikeable women who are barely developed outside of their roles in the snake oil company. Dani and Cecilia’s POVs are told in present, third-person tense versus Rhoda’s first-person, which prioritized Rhoda. I suppose this made the skewering of startups more effective. Mostly, it just made everything more vapid and unpleasant.

I found no comedy or suspense here, other than the morbid curiosity of watching how bad the collective buy in for influencer promoted pablum can get.

Terrific character development and riveting story

I really liked the way the author zoned in on a handful of key characters and fleshed them out in great detail. The story had a twist and turn or two, definitely not overdone as I’ve experienced in some novels. The flow of the storyline was perfect.

Makes me wish I was in a book club so I could discuss it

This book absolutely nails its setting: its descriptions of San Francisco startup culture rang extremely true, with great details (like the massive tech company busses everywhere). The wellness company at its center is entirely believable: before writing this review, the last thing I did on my phone was look up my hormone levels on my fertility app, which served me an ad for a ring that tracks your activity, almost exactly the premise of the fictional company in this book. The book touches on a lot of cultural phenomena, sometimes skewering them, sometimes just observing; it seems not entirely decided about its opinion on modern culture, which helps give the book layers, rather than having a single superficial “take”. It’s also the rare book that features multiple female protagonists and spends almost no attention whatsoever on romance, which was refreshing, instead allowing them to care about careers in the way the real women I know do. The mystery that eventually crops up is almost unnecessary - there’s plenty going on already - but it does add some friction. The story is engaging throughout, but it’s also a book to think about and question afterwards; I’m still mulling it over.