Spent: Memoirs of a Shopping Addict
Cardella, a former model, is a freelance writer in the areas of fashion, photography, and pop culture, but her résumé is rather peripheral to the main thrust of her memoir: her long and debilitating addiction to shopping. This subject has become quite hot lately, with other memoirists confessing their own addictions (not to mention the wildly popular Shopaholic novels by Sophie Kinsella); Cardella’s own story is interesting but ultimately adds little new insight to the subject. It’s the usual story: an addiction to shopping, the relentless acquisition of things she didn’t need (and often never wore or used), was both the result and further cause of problems in her personal life. Cardella openly describes the disastrous effects her addiction had on her life, but readers familiar with the subject may get a general feeling of déjà vu: this is a traumatic story but not a unique one. On the other hand, readers coming to the subject for the first time may be mesmerized by the very idea that you can become addicted to something as seemingly inconsequential as shopping. --David Pitt