Save Karyn
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- £3.99
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- £3.99
Publisher Description
What would you do if you owed $20,000? Would you:
a) Not tell your parents?
b) Stop colouring your hair, having pedicures and buying Gucci?
c) Start your own website that asks for money without apology?
If you were Karyn Bosnak, you'd do all three...
In New York for the first time, with the dream job and the smart flat, Karyn starts spending...and spending. But when it all goes horribly wrong, and her credit card balance mounts in a terrifying manner, Karyn knows that she has to take control. She starts her website www.savekaryn.com on which she fearlessly asks for donations to help pay off her debts. The website receives over 2 million hits and has replies from all over the world - some supportive, many abusive. But after four months, Karyn has become a new woman- debt-free, grateful and happy. This is the hilarious and touching true story of how she does it.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
After moving to New York from Chicago for a lucrative position at a new television court show, Bosnak digs herself into a more than $20,000 hole in less than a year. With stars in her eyes, she blindly plunks down $778 on lingerie here and $387 on a cut and color there. She justifies her frivolity as "emergencies" and "investments" in herself. "I was twenty-seven years old and I wasn't going to be a spring chicken much longer. So I needed these nighties to look as sexy as I could because I needed to land a man. So they were kind of like an investment. An investment in my sex life and an investment in my future." Unable to pay her bills while employed, Bosnak's luck takes a turn for the worse when the court show is canceled. She is able to land a job at yet another TV show, but that, too, doesn't last long. When her financial situation is truly desperate, she posts a "help-needed" message on craigslist.org (an interactive classifieds page). When the site administrators remove her posting, Bosnak decides to set up her own Web site: www. savekaryn.com. With financial contributions from strangers, sales from eBay and donations of all kinds, she's able to pay all her bills in five short months. Each chapter opens with a spread of her credit card statements, outlining her month's purchases. This detail would be sufficient, but this self-absorbed book is filled with the overwhelming minutiae of Bosnak's shallow extravagance, making it hard to empathize with her during tough times or celebrate her escape from debt.