Gloss by Marilyn Kaye

3.5 Stars

Set in the early 1960s this book does a good job of eliciting the general mood of the era and how dramatically things were beginning to change in the Western World.  Teenagers are a relatively new phenomenon and this book follows the exploits of four very disparate girls over one summer.  The only thing they have in common is that they each managed to earn their place on a New York internship at a prestigious teen magazine, the titular Gloss.

Yes, the characters are caricatures of a type but for good reason, allowing the author to show the prevalent attitudes of the time both to women in the workforce but also the pressures brought to bear on the girls who are straddling the line between what their parents and traditional society expects and the new horizons and opportunities that are opening up to them.

Allison is the Beatnik type.  All black clothes, wants to subvert the whole ethos of the magazine and figures the best way to do this is by joining the program.  Although she thinks herself a progressive she is a product of her sheltered wealthy upbringing and when she meets Sam her head is turned by his good lucks and what she thinks are wise pronouncements on the Human Condition.

Pamela is a blonde bombshell.  Tight dresses and glamourous makeup she is determined to follow the guidance in Sex And The Single Girl and is sure she can have the grand love affair without damaging herself.  After being coerced in to a make over by the magazine team she meets the man of her dreams and seems willing to entirely mould herself in to the image of femininity that he seems to expect.

Donna is "Trailer Trash".  Her back story is particularly tragic and I won't spoil it by going in to detail here as it does take a while to be drawn out in the book but it is worth waiting for.  Of the four main characters she is probably the one we know least about but she is the most realistic sounding one as she doesn't hide behind a facade, she just tries to keep a very low profile so she can go completely unnoticed.

Sherry is the traditional Southern Belle.  Coming from a wealthy family with a boyfriend back home that she has already got major life plans with; right down to which sorority she will join at College, when she will get lavaliered, engaged and married to her beau.  She has a rather rigid view of life and for her this internship is a real wake up call that lets her see how sheltered her world view is and also that she has an apparent journalistic talent.

It is undoubtedly a nice easy read that gives a pretty good insight in to a very different and forgotten world.  The only thing that really irritated me was that for a bunch of 18 year olds they do seem very innocent and naive.  Although I wasn't around during this period I am pretty sure they would have been more clued up than this.  Still, it works against the misogyny in the workplace and the rather 1950s attitudes expressed in the magazine.

THIS IS AN HONEST REVIEW OF A FREE COPY OF THE BOOK RECEIVED FROM THE PUBLISHER.