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    Super In The City
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    Super In The City
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    Super In The City
    Audiobook9 hours

    Super In The City

    Written by Daphne Uviller

    Narrated by Emily Janice Card

    3/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    In a city brimming with opportunities for heroism, twenty-seven-year-old Zephyr Zuckerman has often fantasized about committing acts of bravery that would make front-page news. Now she may get her big break-though it may require plunging a few toilets. When the superintendent of her parents' Greenwich Village brownstone is led away in handcuffs, unemployed Zephyr takes over his post and unleashes her inner sleuth: discovering titillating secrets about her tenants-from a smoky-voiced Frenchwoman who entertains throngs of unsavory visitors to a moody musician who just has to be hiding something-and realizing that her new reality is far more intriguing than her imagination.

    Soon Zephyr has sussed out wrongs that stretch from losers on the Internet to art fraud and an international crime ring. The mob thinks she's in the FBI, and the FBI thinks she's in the mob-a predicament she needs to clear up fast. But perhaps not before a cute, surly exterminator helps her solve the mystery of what to do with the rest of her life….


    From the Compact Disc edition.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPenguin Random House Audio
    Release dateJan 27, 2009
    ISBN9780739382172
    Unavailable
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    Reviews for Super In The City

    3/5

    54 ratings18 reviews

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    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 3/5
      Fun and somewhat frenetic mystery story starring Zephyr Zuckerman and her 4 best friends. When the super of her parents' townhouse is unexpectedly hauled off to jail, Zephyr, at her parent's urging, takes over the role of super of the building and starts snooping into the other tenants' lives. With an overactive imagination and an uncertainty as to where her life is going, Zephyr tends to make things up. Unfortunately, eventually her lifestyle leads her right into a mafia-type situation. Fun and quick read.
    • 3/5
      I kept putting this book down, but when I finally had the time to give it its due, I was pleasantly surprised. It is definitely chick lit, but it did not feel formulaic or forced. Instead Zephyr has a genuinely funny voice. It's a quick read that is perfect for when you have watched all your romantic comedies.Zephyr's foray into being an apartment super leads her to mysteries, romance and the occasional plugged toilet. I did wish that, considering she had all these great ideas she had about being a super, that she had tried a bit harder at it. But, I suppose that would have been out of character.This is not a deep read, but, if you are in the mood for chick-lit with a mystery twist, this is the book for you.
    • 3/5
      A fun read - frothy, romantic, happy ending, amusing.
    • 1/5
      Another "did not finish". I thought it was a mystery based on a recommendation that I saw but it isn't, at least not so far as I can tell. It is chick lit and I get so tired reading this type of book, the angst, the self-examination, the naval gazing. Grrrrr.
    • 4/5
      I actually really enjoyed this book! Chicklit has been letting me down for awhile, but this book was better than I thought it would be. Zephyr is a late-20s chick who keeps changing career directions in her life. Currently, she is unemployed and desperate so she accepts her parents suggestion that she become the Super for their Manhattan apartment building. This, of course, leads to Rear Window-type spying on the renters, a murder mystery and a meet-cute with the exterminator. What I really liked is that Zephyr had a funny mental voice full of hormones over hot guys and the way she interacts with her friends is the same way I do. I also have a new phrase to use from the book, "(the guy) was so sexy that I felt the polish slide off my toenails".
    • 4/5
      Super in the City has waited patiently upon my bookshelf for months, and this week I finally had a chance to sit down and consume Uviller's fun and fluffy NYC novel. I was pleased to find that the novel was not nearly as cheesy as I had anticipated, and although it often seemed a bit unorganized and cluttered, Uviller's useage of fun and creative phrases and descriptions kept me interested. The heroine, a high-strung and imaginative 20-something, was easy to relate to and charmingly scatterbrained. However, the real gems of Uviller's novel were her fun turns of phrase that popped up when least expected. This mystery/chick-lit novel boasts a unique plot and an array of characters that seem to fit certain stereotypes, but then end up surprising the reader again and again. The romantic in my squealed in delight over the $10 scene at the court house (but I'll say no more about that), and the mysterious happenings in the brownstone held my attention far more firmly than I ever expected. I look forward to reading more of Uviller's work in the future!
    • 3/5
      Even though I reviewed this book soon after I received and read it (2/18 as evidenced by the rating I had given it) somehow the review has been lost. I will review this book from memory as I lost my physical library in an apartment fire May 3. The main character, Zephyr, is immature and vacuous. She is trying to unravel a mystery which turns out to be seamy and distasteful. Her love interest is brooding, distrustful and, yet somehow, way too good for the inept wannabe detective. I think this book could have focused more on her responsibilities as a super and the interesting tenants in her building without having to resort to a "Nancy Drew" whodunit plotline.
    • 3/5
      For lovers of fluffy chick lit far and wide...you've found a great book. For lovers of mystery or anything with more than half a brain...not so much. While the premise of the book is entertaining, and pretty much all of the supporting characters are likable, the main character Zephyr made me want to bash my head against a wall. There isn't a page in the book where this ditzy twelve-year-old in a twenty-seven-year-old's body didn't run off on some outlandish fantasy involving a random man, and fantastic career, or both. She obsesses over inane crap, and figures out the mystery a good ten pages after most intelligent readers would. The supporting cast of friends, families, lovers and ex-lovers are much more interesting and entertaining, and it would have been nice to cut Zephyr out of the book all-together to just focus on them. They, and their respective stories, are why I gave the book so high a rating. This book is light, fluffy, and fun to read, and perfect if you like to listen to grown women whining about how they don't want to grow up.
    • 3/5
      If you like Lauren Weisberger's novels, you'll enjoy this book - Uviller shares a similar writing style, but the plot is all her own. Uviller's characters are likeable and accessible, like the sexy pest control man, the mysterious French woman with a secret door and a plethora of gentlemen callers, and the elderly neighbor who is convinced the next building-related tragedy is knocking at her door. The main character, Zephyr, is a plucky, sweet heroine who doesn't necessarily know what she wants out of life, and often feels inadequate next to her accomplished friends. With the arrest of the super in her parents' apartment building, Zephyr takes on the job and quickly learns it's not as easy as it looks.Overall, a good read for a cold winter night!
    • 4/5
      In the wake of the former superintendant's arrest, Zephyr Zuckerman finds herself in charge of the Greenwhich Village building she has occupied her entire life. At 27, Zephyr still hasn't decided what she wants to do when she grows up, but she has no difficulty concocting ambitious, albeit farfetched, plans for herself. Zephyr's new job as super is her first foray into true responsibility and sets her life into motion, even if it isn't as exciting as she imagined.I was expecting the book to be more of a more mystery, but with the exception of a sub-plot involving an exotic French neighbor, the story is largely about Zephyr (and her potential boyfriend and her girlfriends and their potential boyfriends). I don't usually enjoy novels in the "chick lit" genre, but I liked this book as a bit of escapist fun. Zephyr and her friends were witty, self-deprecating, and had lives that were comprised of more than their dates and fashion choices.
    • 5/5
      I greatly enjoyed this book. Once I picked it up it was hard to put it down. At first I found Zephyr's over active imagination a little annoying nd felt that it was delaying the story. However, once I got sed to the author's style I found her imaginative scenarios rather funny. The way her different activities throughout the story come full circle in the end is very interesting and I think made for a good ending.
    • 3/5
      Uviller herself is clearly an "angel of snarkiness and sensitivity." The book does drag a bit in the middle, but still an enjoyable read.
    • 3/5
      I was excited to receive Super in the City from the LibraryThing Early Reviewers program. I've received some great books from this program and I had high hopes for the novel. I think the idea of a female super in a New York City apartment building is cute and has a lot of potential; unfortunately, Super in the City doesn't seem to measure up.I have to say, I didn't really enjoy this book. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't very good either. I wonder if I'm being too harsh, though. Did I expect too much and it just not meet my expectations? Was I just not in the mood for it when I was reading it? I can't say for certain. All I can say is that Super in the City didn't hold my interest and I didn't really like the characters.The mystery within the story is interesting enough, but it seems rather offhand, as if it was added in later. Still, it's well-written and provides additional entertainment. I'd love to see a sequel to the book in which Zephyr becomes a sort of PI for hire and solves crimes. I'd definitely read that one!My main character problem was with Zephyr; I felt like she had no direction. She seemed to have the maturity level of a much younger child. She couldn't commit to anything in life because she seemed to want to do everything. While this enthusiasm is understandable in a younger adult, it is difficult to accept that a 27-year-old refuses to do anything with her life because she can't do everything. It seems immature and tantamout to some sort of tantrum - "If I can't do everything I wanna do, I'm not going to do anything!"Like I said before, I don't know if I'm being overly critical and I feel bad because it definitely wasn't a bad book. It just definitely left something to be desired and didn't really hold my interest. The idea was extremely promising and I hope that Ulliver follows up on the threads she left dangling at the end of Super in the City. Though this novel wasn't for me, I would be more than willing to give any of her future books a chance.
    • 3/5
      I enjoyed this book more than I thought I would. It was fun and I enjoyed the silly situations. I thought that the characters could be developed a lot more. I think this is a good start for a series of books. I am definately interested in what else could possibly go on in the apartment building. What other mysteries are there to be solved? I think the now that the main character is getting her P.I. licence and her boyfriend is a cop a lot more can come of the series. I particularly think a lot could come of the SGs too. There are a lot of good beginnings in the book. I really think that the author could really make something of the book if she directed it more towards the mystery of the book. Though I enjoyed it for what it was, I really thought a lot more could have been done with it. I hope the author and publisher take another look at it.
    • 3/5
      'Super in the City' is an indulgent piece of fluff -- a very entertaining indulgent piece of fluff. Realistically, that's all I really need to say, but I suppose since it was sent to me for free, I should repay the obligation with a few details.The novel has pretensions toward crime fiction/mystery, and in fact feels a little bit like the first in a sleuth series, so I won't be surprised if a few months down the road the early reviewers list features a "Zephyr Zuckerman, P.I." sequel. The problem here, however (and this is not unique to Uviller's book, but happens frequently in various ways to many "first" books) is that the novel isn't quite sure that mystery is what it wants to be when it grows up. It also quite likes the idea of being a modern romance novel, and spends much of its time developing in that direction. On the other hand, it feels obligated, having introduced the idea at the beginning, to develop its "Sex and the City"-esque homage to urban female foursomes (in this case, occasionally a fivesome) and its love affair with New York City (occasionally feeling like "The Local's Guide to the Village"). While I am a fan of both genre crossover and thinking outside of the box (and have no inherent issue with the concept of an urban chick-lit mystery romance), the trouble here is that the novel never quite finds its balance. It becomes so focused, often for chapters at a time, on one aspect of its multi-faceted nature that it and the reader forget about, say, the mystery that's supposed to be unfolding; the shifts to the next facet are therefore awkward and feel ill-timed.Beyond its genre-identity crisis, the novel has other balance problems. Few would expect originality in a piece with such a title, and the general lack of it here doesn't trouble me -- I'm all for Renaissance-style poetic license and I believe that a little artistic "borrowing" can make a story satisfyingly familiar -- but there are moments when the writing treads painfully near the tired and the cliche. Some of the moments are obviously deliberate (really, please be deliberate), as with the opening, which includes one hopeless gem ("Gregory.... who wound up saving me in ways I didn't even know I needed to be saved.") that is thankfully, if you will forgive me, redeemed by the words immediately following: "(I don't mean saved in a Jesus way. This is not a Jesus-saving kind of story.)" Yeah, I laughed at that too. There are some snappy, funny moments here, but there are also moments where Uviller seems to forget that the uber-cheese needs to be cut with a healthy dose of wit or sarcasm, lest the reader be injured by excessive eye-rolling.Still, unbalanced as it is (not unlike some people I know), Uviller's debut entertains with a quick pace and a light story that, even in its awkward moments, is pretty enjoyable. I don't anticipate that this one will be heaped with literary awards, but if you are in the mood for an urban chick-lit mystery romance, you could do a lot worse.
    • 5/5
      Daphne Uviller, you rock! I really found this debut novel to be a wonderful adventure and just fun. The story was interesting and the language had a nice flow from beginning to end. She held me from page one with her witty sense of humor and I loved the fact she didn't dumb down her references or innuendos to people, places and things. I will admit, I was a bit apprehensive when the main character, Zephyr Zuckerman had to discuss everything with her girlfriends a 'la Sex and the City. But then I realized, Sex and the City doesn't have a monopoly on a girl having a close pack of girlfriends to discuss things with, and the title may have been a tongue in cheek reference to not only the fact that Zephyr ends up being the superintendent of her parents brownstone, but to the show also. I couldn't believe how long it took Zephyr to put the pieces together to solve the mystery swirling around her, but, the fact that she's a little ADHD and her focus is easily drawn away especially when fantasizing different scenarios, allowed me to suspend disbelief and just enjoy the ride. Really nicely done and highly recommended. Kudos!So, in homage to Zephyr Zuckerman -- I can just see the author Daphne Uviller reading this review and thinking, 'that Dana Jean is one cool bitch. I think I'll fly her to New York City for my book party and put her up for the weekend--at the publisher's expense--and I'll personally show her around the town and we'll become BFF's forever. Or at the very least, maybe I'll send her an advanced reader's copy of my next novel.' :-)
    • 4/5
      I really liked this story. It was a very fun and easy read. One of my favorite things was the lead character, Zephyer, she was so zany and had a very active imagination. I think she was a little slow to catch on to some things around her, but that was only because she was imagining a conspiracy going on around her at all times. She was really someone that I would have been friends with in school, and her friends were all established in their jobs but were just as silly as she was. The only draw back that I thought of while reading this, was that I would have liked to see more of her work as the super of the building. It was almost glossed over that she was the super at some parts of the story, and I had really expected to read more of how she handled her new job. Other than that, I really did enjoy this light, funny, mystery chick lit book. Worth my time.
    • 4/5
      I really enjoyed reading this book! It was a quick, easy read, but not so much of a typical "chick lit" book that I felt embarrassed to be reading it on the train! I was occasionally frustrated by the characters and some of the things that they did and said, but overall I thought the plot was inventive and fun, and I definitely found myself rooting for the main characters to end up together in the end.Overall, even though this was more of a light-hearted, easy read than I usually choose, I couldn't put it down! I generally only make time to read on my commute to and from work, but I was picking this book back up every chance I got. Well worth your time if you like funny and slightly mysterious love stories!