Workhorse: A darkly funny debut novel about envy, ambition and New York’s fashion elite

‘Razor-sharp and deliciously wry’ COCO MELLORS

‘Funny, tender, thrillingly dark’ HEATHER DARWENT

‘Exhilarating, beguiling, beautiful’ OLIVIA PETTER

An astonishing portrait of a city on the brink of a dizzying new era and a story about a young woman who will do anything to infiltrate the rarefied world of New York’s fashion elite.

New York City, 2001.

Editorial Assistant Clodagh “Clo” Harmon wants nothing more than to rise through the ranks at the world’s most prestigious fashion magazine. But there’s just one problem: she doesn’t have the right pedigree. Clo is a ‘workhorse’ in a world of beautiful, wealthy, impossibly well-connected ‘show horses’ and it seems that her fortunes will never change. That is until Clo meets Harry Wood, a reporter with visions of his own media empire and the person who might be Clo’s ally in gaming the system…or is he the only thing standing between Clo and her rightful place at the top?

Clo begins to wade across boundaries, taking ever greater and more dangerous risks to become the Important Person she wants to be. But who is Clo under all the borrowed designer clothes and studied manners? And who are we if we share her desires?

As wickedly funny as it is darkly unsettling, Workhorse is an astonishing story of envy and ambition, set against the glamour and privilege of media and high society in New York at its height.

From the Publisher

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Fourth Estate
Publication date ‏ : ‎ 15 Jan. 2026
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Print length ‏ : ‎ 560 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0008732205
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0008732202
Item weight ‏ : ‎ 790 g
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 15.9 x 5 x 24 cm
Best Sellers Rank: 1,449 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) 87 in Women’s Literary Fiction (Books) 161 in Humorous Fiction 279 in Literary Fiction (Books)
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