An Office Novel That Dares to Think Outside the Cubicle

THE VERY NICE BOX
By Laura Blackett and Eve Gleichman

When I first heard about Woebot, the digital psychotherapy service, I scoffed. To me, a geriatric Gen Xer, phone therapy with Alexa sounded as impersonal and unsatisfying as phone sex with a stranger. I was similarly skeptical opening “The Very Nice Box,” a workplace satire that hinges, in part, on a millennial seeking e-counseling by app. But it turns out that the novel’s authors, Laura Blackett and Eve Gleichman, are linguistic magicians, and their sparkling debut manages to expose the hollowness of well-being jargon while exploring, with tender care and precision, how we dare to move on after unspeakable loss.

Ava Simon is the star engineer at Städa, an Ikea-like furniture company that manufactures functional household items and gives them prescriptive, New Agey names (e.g., Encouraging Desk Chairs, Supportive Door Hooks, the Very Nice Box). Städa is undergoing a full-scale restructuring; and the meticulous Ava, who “liked to think of each day as a series of efficiently divided 30-minute units,” observes the shifting culture with dread. (“Am I in a cult?” she wonders, after spotting self-care directives like “Practice Radical Compassion” on a blackboard.) Ava’s detachment and despair, however, have far deeper roots. A year before, her girlfriend and parents were tragically killed, leaving her traumatized and mired in grief.

Enter Mathew Putnam, the fist-bumping, powwowing new head of product. A Wharton M.B.A. bro, Mat was hired to “redefine productivity” by injecting newfangled tech-world confidence into buttoned-up Städa. Along with “Yes, And” meetings, he installs a “neg alarm,” to be sounded after the utterance of words like “no,” “but” and “can’t”; and “Positivity Mandates,” like compulsory text-therapy via an app called Shrnk. If the Very Nice Box is Ava’s passion project, then Ava herself quickly becomes Mat’s. Determined to help her heal, he persuades Ava to call in sick, rediscover joy — and give Shrnk a chance.

Naturally, Ava is distrustful. But she knows she’s drowning — plus, her feelings for Mat are confusing — so she logs in. Surprisingly, her Shrnk’s advice isn’t terrible. (“You know, dread and excitement are two sides of the same coin” and “Who could you be if you flipped the coin?”) The visualization exercises actually make sense: “She had to pull herself out of the well of despair. Imagine a rope, her Shrnk might say. Who could you be if you climbed the rope?”