(Fourth Estate, $39.99)Non-fiction books claiming to try and make sense of the contradictory demands of the 21st century woman don’t usually rock my boat. In fact, I usually throw them straight into the out-tray. But this one came very highly recommended so I picked it up. I loved the jacket so I turned it over. I saw the amazingly reasonable price for a hardcover book so I got it. Then I read it. And laughed and laughed and absolutely loved every wonderful page. It’s sort of a guide to being a modern woman which somehow manages to read like a novel. To be honest, it’s a trifle hard to explain, but the authors describe it as your mother, your best friend, your guru and your shrink, wrapped up in book form, with jokes. And they’re absolutely right.
Two British writers with their fingers on a very honest pulse have gotten together and written in the royal “we” voice about what it is like to be a fat or thin or rich or poor or a mother or not, among many other things. At times, I felt as though they had written this book just for me and I’ll bet that anyone else who reads it will find at least one chapter that speaks just as clearly to them. It was the most wonderfully reassuring experience. If I sound like I’m just about to run off and join the Backwards in High Heels cult, it turns out I’m already in it. We all are. But we’re in it together.
Buy this for a struggling new mum, a girlfriend with the blues, a sister caught out in the current economic nightmare or get it for yourself if you just feel the need for a pat on the back and no-one is giving you one. The title, by the way, is from – or more accurately is about – Ginger Rogers, of whom it was said, “She did everything Fred Astaire did, only backwards and in high heels.” You got that right, sister.
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