Ok, so you’ve heard of Mad Men right? The hip show that follows the lives of a bunch of chain smoking, hard drinking men and women who work in advertising in the 1960’s centred around the ‘mysterious’ Don Draper and the many women that he smashes each week. If you haven’t heard of it maybe check out this video where Don Draper says ‘what’ a bunch of times – it gives you a real good feel for the show:

But seriously, check it out. It’s probably my favourite show from the last three or four years.

Anyway, there’s a character, Roger Sterling, who’s one of the partners of the advertising firm they all work for and has some of the best lines in the show e.g. when a newly promoted employee gets his foot cut off in a bizarre accident in the office – ‘just when he got it in the door’; when the company has to fire half of its employees – ‘well, I gotta go learn a bunch of people’s names before I fire them’.

In the latest series, it is revealed that he’s writing his autobiography which is subsequently published and entitled ‘Sterling’s Gold’. When surfing Amazon recently for Christmas presents I was pretty surprised to see the book advertised in my ‘recommended’ section. What can I say, Amazon knows me too well. Surely it couldn’t actually exist? It looked exactly the same as it did in the TV show though and was advertised as the autobiography of an ad man, so I figured somebody actually wrote this and I actually quite wanted to read it: Roger is my favourite character and pretty interesting so I figured it would be a worthwhile read and only add to my enjoyment of the show. In addition to this my dad is a huge Mad Men fan as well so i figured I’d order it for  him as a Christmas present and that I could probably read it myself after he was done with it. Two birds with one stone. Boom. Ordered.

It turned up yesterday and I have got to say it is probably one of the biggest disappointments of my life. Not only is it 100% not what it was advertised as, it is also so crappy I’m probably going to have to get my dad another xmas present instead of it (I was gonna get him more than one present ok, just like one MORE now). It wasn’t anything close to being an autobiography of Roger Sterling – it’s just a book with a bunch of bad quality photos from the show and a bunch of one liners from Roger from the show. In short, it’s a complete waste of time. Although it does look quite nice. But there is absolutely no reason why anybody would want to own this. In short, even if you’re a huge fan of the show and Roger Sterling DO NOT BUY THIS. If you want to hear some of Roger’s best quotes just watch this video instead:

I guess I was probably slightly naive to think that somebody would write a full autobiography of a fictional character, but that’s what it was marketed as, and the way viral marketing works right now I figured Mad Men had just been supremely clever by advertising it through a plotline in the show. Well, I guess they still have been, as suckers like me are still buying it and they didn’t even have to write it. Those fvcking ad men.