Very good read - Rated 
Nan has a tricky relationship with her employer, Mrs X. A non-existant relationship with Mr X. But she loves their little boy to peices.
In between looking after four-year-old Grayer and running a thousand errands for Mrs X, his rich, uptight Manhattanite mother, Nan is trying to have a life. There's college, shopping, her friends, her cat George. And the gorgeous Harvard boy from the sixth floor...
But the X family's dramas keep intruding - visits from Mr X's predatory mistress, catastrophic family outings and, as a final straw, the case of the marriage-destroying panties. As divorce looms, Nan realises how attatched she's become to the X's underloved son - and how nannying has become more than just a job.
Funny, touching and true-to-life, 'The Nanny Diaries' is a modern-day Mary Poppins story - with attitude.
I wanted to read this book, because I am myself a qualified nursery nurse, and considered Nannying when I first qualified. I ended up in day nurseries instead, and know just how much of your life is taken up by the little people in your care. I knew that this book would be something I could relate to. I wasn't wrong.
While the situation is dramatised, in comparison to what I have experienced, I can feel Nan's pain and frustration! When you work with kids, you really do fall in love with them, and I felt so sad at the end when she left. It's hard to leave your kids.
I thought this book was very well written, and very entertaining. I think I have just finished it in a couple of sittings, because I didn't want to put it down.
The story line, of the completely neurotic mother amused me. Do people like Mrs X really exist in real life?? I'm suprised Nan lasted as long as she did. I think I would have a few choice words to say to the X's if I met them.
A great book, which tells a great story. If I ever thought about getting a Nannying job now, I think I would forget it though, because this book does highlight the point that you could well be trapped with a family you don't like.
book rating: 9/10
Highly recommended! - Rated 
Highly recommended to the metropolitan mummies and daddies and the mother/father-soon-to-be. Can't really put it down, funny, yet touching and feel so sorry to little Grayer, he doesn't deserved all these! Hope the Mr. & Mrs. Xes around us wake up someday...
First against the wall. Please. - Rated 
Good book, definitely enjoyed it, but I'm still feeling a bit disturbed after finishing it. If people as horrific and overpriviledged as those who hire Nanny in the book really exist, something needs to be done about it. I suggest killing them, and then rendering them down into dogfood. It may sound harsh, but it's no more than they deserve.
The ordeals of an exploited nanny - Rated
While studying for a major in child development, Nan takes a part time job looking after four year old Grayer, the son of a wealthy Manhattan couple, the Xes. The Xes are a horror. The beautiful Mrs X, who has got rid of one Nanny after another, exploits Nan horribly. While she spends fortunes on luxury clothes and accoutrements, she pays Nan a pittance (and irregularly at that), but gets her to run all her errands as well and to make herself generally useful about the house, and she rings her constantly during her time off with more demands. She is narcissistic, totally selfish, incapable of showing any affection for Grayer, but bombards Nanny with little notes listing exactly what Grayer is supposed to do and when. She is devastated and incredulous when Grayer is not accepted for the top school to which the children of some of her friends have been accepted, and has Nanny instructed by a Long-Term Development Consultant who indicates that Nanny has been playing too much with the four year old instead of relentlessly instructing him. Mr X pays even less attention to the little boy, to the latter's acute distress on the few occasions when Mr X is in the house: most of the time he is in Chicago and having an affaire with a woman on his staff there.
The reader constantly rebels on Nan's behalf, but Nan is unable to make a stand against the monstrous Mrs X - partly because she needs the money and partly because she and the little boy have really bonded. Much as she dislikes her employer, she is even distressed on her behalf when Nan discovers Mr X's affaire, shortly before Mrs X does herself. Right up to the painful end, she is really too good to be true.
The dialogue in this book between Nanny and Grayer is terrific; Mrs X reveals her character in everything she says and writes. A characteristic phrase of hers is `I need you to ...' - some need! She herself totally ignores every need that Nan has. I found the sections dealing with Nan's off-duty life - about her grandmother and her parents and about her involvement with the gorgeous `Harvard Hottie' (H.H.) who lives on a higher floor in Mrs X's apartment block - less interesting.
The authors have found splendidly apposite quotations to put at the head of each chapter.
Easy Read - Rated
Like reading Glamour or Cosmo. Good Enough. Also good at showing underemployement of overeducated 20 somethings in general.
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