Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Here's another review for you while I run out and buy that Starbucks gift card

Bergdorf Blondes: A Novel Bergdorf Blondes: A Novel by Plum Sykes

This book came in the mail today and I don't know why. Did I order it from half.com? Or one of Amazon.com's used book sellers? Did I win it in a Bloggy Giveaway? Is it a present? I have no idea.

However, I checked it for drugs, and it came out clean. No suspicious white powder. So I figured what the hell, I'll read it.

However. I'm only a couple of pages into it, and something about the rich, vapid women in "good buildings" on Park Avenue seems eerily familiar. Which leaves me wondering: has Chick-lit become so generic that it's become one big French-manicured blur--or have I actually read this book?

Only time will tell.

++++UPDATED++++

I'm very sorry to say this, because it means either Plum Sykes is a lousy writer or I have early-onset Alzheimer's, but I'm several chapters in, and I still can't tell whether I've read this before. Some parts of it seem familiar, like the passages about Brazilians.

But then, hasn't every single book about rich women in New York wasted gallons of ink obsessing about pubic hair? The only thing worse than the J. Sisters material in Bergdorf Blondes is a passage from a different book whose name I can't recall. Thankfully, it took place in London.

I say thankfully because in this book, the aging female protagonist decided, upon taking a new lover, that her nether 'do needed some touching up, so she got busy with a bottle of auburn hair dye and a toothbrush, and then finished things off with a spritz of some kind of hair sheen product that contained tiny bits of gold glitter--only to discover that it all rubbed off all over Mr. Wonderful's face.

And now, if you're mesmerized by a mental picture of a man walking around with the bottom half of his face stained a strange shade of orange-brown and twinkling with wee bits of fairy gold--in broad daylight, mind you--you'll know why I don't read more chick-lit than I do.

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10 comments:

  1. So I'm not the only one who can read halfway through a book before realizing that I've already read it?

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  2. Sadly enough, no. You're not.

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  3. Ah, so your little gag gift book following the NY excursion arrived!!

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  4. Yeah. I know. How many pages into a Ludlam do you have to get before you realize.......

    ;-)

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  5. I think you mis-spelled that, P. Shouldn't it be 'Only TOME will tell?'

    ;)

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  6. Yeah but, hair dye and glitter....this would be perfect evidence to haul him into divorce court with.

    FA

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  7. I was halfway through "Cold Mountain" before realizing I wasn't clairvoyent, I'd read it a few years ago.
    Dr. B says he's going to wrap it up and give it to me as a present periodically.

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  8. Clearly I haven't read enough chick-lit, YIKES. It does sound like an episode of Sex and the City, though. Can't you just see that happening to Samantha?

    Oh, right. You are reading the SATC-TM book because you aren't going to see the movie or the shows. Well, that's the sort of thing you are MISSING by not watching the show or movie.

    (but I remembered :before: I entered my vw and hit "publish your comment" so maybe I'm not going crazy at least.)

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  9. I don't know ... I guess I'm just unbelievably prudish, but I find that sort of thing more embarrassing than funny.

    Of course, I found I Love Lucy more embarrassing than funny. Even as a child, I cringed a lot.

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  10. Oh dear, pity she had no laptop or she would have known about bettybeauty.com... maybe a review on BlogHer is required P

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Gentle Readers:

For the time being, I have turned off comment moderation. Please don't spam; it's not nice.

xxx, Poppy.