and The Three-Martini Family Vacation: A Field Guide to Intrepid Parenting. She followed those books with Raised by Wolves.She applied the “Page 99 Test” to her new book, You Look Fine, Really, and reported the following:
I skip to page 99: It’s a page marking a new section in the book. The page is illustrated with a drawing of a smart paper-doll ensemble, including a paper crown. Peeking out from one of the paper-doll sleeves is a paper-doll hand holding a martini. The caption reads, “I’ve Been to a Marvelous Party.” You Look Fine, Really is sprinkled with illustrations of paper doll clothing, but this page marks the beginning of a whole group of chapters devoted to celebration. And that one little nugget (a lyric from a Noel Coward song) really does sum up the sentiment of my book. Because although my book does appear to be a rather random compendium of beauty, fashion and survival tips for the maturing woman, the book is, at its heart, one big celebration.Browse inside You Look Fine, Really, and learn more about the book and author at Christie Mellor's website.
Sure, it’s a snarky, fun alternative to painful surgery and injections, meant to do for women what The Three-Martini Playdate did for parents. But it’s more than just a diatribe against shooting bovine botulism into your forehead. It’s a tribute to women who’ve inspired me, a tribute to good friends, a tribute to personal style, to lipstick, to party hats, to creativity, to pretty much any random area that I thought might be of interest to a population of maturing females.
So of course “I’ve Been to a Marvelous Party” reveals the quality of the whole book; as I hope it reveals the quality of your whole life. I’d love to have my book serve as a reminder that twenty, thirty, forty or fifty years hence, we all should look back on whatever the hell it was we did and be able to say with conviction, “I HAVE been to a marvelous party!”
--Marshal Zeringue