Mood:
amorousTopic: Entertainment
"We walk like models, we walk like models, in the lipstick jungle, the lipstick jungle..." or so sings my favorite New Orleans band, The Vettes. Last week, I finished reading Candace Bushnell's (author of Sex and the City) fourth book, Lipstick Jungle.
I wondered if it would be eerily similar to Sex and the City, but it wasn't. Of course, it follows three successful women in New York, but that's where the similarities end.
We meet Nico O'Neilly, editor-in-chief of Bonfire magazine; Wendy Healy, president of Paradour Pictures; and Victory Ford, fashion designer.
The sections about O'Neilly had to be my favorite. I think I was secretly wishing I was her, an editor of a popular women's magazine. However, I loved her character, right along with the steamy affair she was having with a male underwear model.
Healy's character was sad—completely successful career, but a generally deadbeat husband who kept begging for a divorce. With kids involved, it was messy. And for Ford, she was the only single gal of the bunch, but dating one of the richest men in the city. Although, when it didn't work out, she wonders if she is cut out for any real relationship.
When I looked on Amazon.com, I found some cool questions Bushnell answered:
"The characters in Lipstick Jungle were inspired by real-life women I know and admire in New York City. As with Sex and the City, I spent lots of time thinking about where women were today, and what I noticed was that there was a fascinating group of women in their forties who were leading non-traditional lives. They were highly successful and motivated, they often had children, and usually were the providers for their families, and yet, they didn't fit the old stereotype of the witchy businesswoman. Indeed, so many of these women were the girls next door, the girls who reminded me of my best friends when I was a kid and we used to fantasize about the great things we were going to do in life. Like the women in Sex and the City, the Lipstick Jungle women are charting new lives for themselves, redefining what it means to be a woman when you really are as powerful, or more powerful, than a man.
Check out Bushnell on her website here.
You may recall Lipstick Jungle as a TV series on NBC, starring Brooke Shields as Wendy, Kim Raver as Nico, and Lindsay Price as Victory. Although I haven't seen any of the episodes, I'm pretty sure it wasn't as good as the book since it only survived two seasons.
However, I would still recommend this book to women everywhere—a great pick-me-up read!
