Primates of Park Avenue

Adventures Inside the Secret Sisterhood of Manhattan Moms

By: Wednesday Martin Ph.D. Ph.D.

Narrated by: Madeleine Maby

An instant #1 New York Times bestseller, Primates of Park Avenue is an “amusing, perceptive and…deliciously evil” (The New York Times Book Review) memoir of the most secretive and elite tribe—Manhattan’s Upper East Side mothers.

When Wednesday Martin first arrives on New York City’s Upper East Side, she’s clueless about the right addresses, the right wardrobe, and the right schools, and she’s taken aback by the glamorous, sharp-elbowed mommies around her. She feels hazed and unwelcome until she begins to look at her new niche through the lens of her academic background in anthropology. As she analyzes the tribe’s mating and migration patterns, childrearing practices, fetish objects, physical adornment practices, magical purifying rituals, bonding rites, and odd realities like sex segregation, she finds it easier to fit in and even enjoy her new life. Then one day, Wednesday’s world is turned upside down, and she finds out there’s much more to the women who she’s secretly been calling Manhattan Geishas.

“Think Gossip Girl, but with a sociological study of the parents” (InStyle), Wednesday’s memoir is absolutely “eye-popping” (People). Primates of Park Avenue lifts a veil on a secret, elite world within a world—the strange, exotic, and utterly foreign and fascinating life of privileged Manhattan motherhood.

Interesting take on the upper east side...

Although the timeline was a little bit jumpy. One minute the writer is walking to her fitness class in the Hamptons and next she is in a car fighting for a parking space to get to the same class she was just walking to.

A little stretched for dramatic moments at times but has real moments as the story moves along.

Listened to as recommended from other audible

I did purchase this audible book as it was recommended by the author of another audible book I listened to. At first I wasn't sure if it was what I was expecting and it wasn't, but I did complete it and so glad I did. you really must listen all the way to the end! No spoilers here.

Great book

This book was amazing! Great summer read I loved this book because I dream one day to live in Manhattan. But for the time being I’ll just live upstate NY where I live

Entho-tainment at its best

Although the reading was staccato at times, Martin's voice pulls through. This is an ideal introduction to anthropology and a glimpse into the ways elite Mommy's make sense of and navigate their world. It is both critical and generous at times - as good ethnography is. It is not traditional anthro-vetted by IRBs and underscored by dense theory- but it is approachable and entertaining and is quite good ethnography, earning its place alongside monographs ideal for intro to cultural or intro to anthro courses.

Interesting almost scientific read

As someone who has studied anthropology I found this book an interesting read. It is simple enough for someone with no background but I the parts I enjoyed most were her 'field notes' on the costuming of her tribe. Overall it's a more cerebral than your average chick lit but would never the less fit loosely into that category.