Four Blondes

Title: Four Blondes
Author: Candace Bushnell
Publishing Date: 2001

Candace Bushnell, Sex and the City’s iconic author has returned to elucidate the lives of four privileged Manhattanites. Four Blondes is divided into separate novellas each appropriately titled, ‘NiceN’Easy’, ‘Highlights (For Adults)’, ‘Platinum’, and ‘Single Process’. As the velvet curtain is raised, the unsightly nature of beauty, wealth and power is exposed.

Janey, the pseudo-celeb/ex-model, has her sights set on snagging a man. Basically any man will do, just as long as they’re a billionaire and most importantly, owns a house(s) in the Hamptons. She’s your common gold-digger, enjoying the good life and never footing the bill- her exquisite beauty being the golden ticket to everything she has ever wanted. She maneuvers her way into the elite world by craftily playing the power-players and keeps her arsenal full of wealthy friends who’ll consequently, introduce her to wealthy men. Janey doesn’t think she’s using men for their money, but rather taking a feminist stand for “the redistribution of wealth”.

Winnie and James Diekes, both journalists (and highly competitive- secretly hating the other for their success) live in a posh apartment on the Upper West Side. They seem to have the perfect marriage on the exterior, but the interior is in desperate need of a re-decorating job. The walls are bare, the furniture absent, and both consciously evade the fact that their marriage is in a serious rut. The Diekes are conservative by of “I hate everyone who’s not like me”. Fast food, red meat and yappy dogs are considered evil, along with anyone who associates themselves with them. Slowly, their world begins to unravel as scandal and affairs consume their orderly, monotonous existence.

Next we have Cecelia, an heiress who’s convinced that she’s the center of a conspiracy, paranoid that everyone’s secretly involved in a plot to destroy her. She religiously reads Page Six for evidence that’ll prove her theories correct, and entertains her deluded thoughts by recording them all in a diary. You wouldn’t be surprised to learn that most of her day is spent at the shrink’s office where she spats out accusations and defensive objections and is subsequently prescribed Xanax.

The last character we’re introduced to is a single woman from New York who writes a sex column (sounds oddly familiar, don’t you think?) She begins by explaining, “We have a saying in New York: English girls who are considered beautiful in London are merely “pretty” in New York, while American girls who are called “attractive” in New York are beautiful in London”. This outlines the basic premise for the story. The writer is fed up with trying to find a decent man in New York. So when the opportunity arises to relocate to London, she doesn’t hesitate to pick up everything and try her luck overseas.

These mini-stories provide fleeting glimpses into the lives of four very different women. Some end up happy; and others well, not so much. It’s an honest way of looking at life and I liked the way these particular characters were set up, their lives contrasted. Each is extremely unique and different, yet similar in regard to their current situation. They are all facing a similar crossroad- whether to settle for what’s familiar and comfortable, or to take a chance at finding happiness and what they truly want out of life.

The novelty of these characters and their lives is what I enjoyed most about this book. However, just like Sex and the City, I didn’t like the format and writing style. Well, let me clarify- I liked the idea of separate novellas and their creative titles, but there just wasn’t enough continuity throughout the entire piece. Two novellas are considerably long, while the others are extremely short. The short stories give you the feeling of incompleteness, like it’s a summary or preview of what’s to come. We are abruptly shoved into this character’s life, and then pushed back out with no real connection to who they really are. This occurs with the last character in particular, I don’t even know her name (I just assumed it was Carrie Bradshaw). Within the four novellas, there are millions of sub-sections that get annoying. For example, two of Winnie’s sections are titled, “Something Bad Happens” and “Something Good Happens”. Bushnell was probably trying to mirror the format/voice with the couple’s mundane lives, but it’s just comes across too explicitly. The third person narrative drones on in a sort of a “this is Spot, see Spot run” style. Cecilia’s bit is flooded with “Dear Diary this and Dear Diary that”, and it gets old fast. There is a lot of overemphasizing and too much detail that we could do without and still enjoy and understand the book’s intentions. In the end, we know a lot about the women, facts and tidbits, but we don’t exactly know them.

Recommendation:
Bushnell does a good job of contrasting these characters and detailing the “madness” within their own personal world. If you’re the type of reader that’s interested in the finer points, examining the niceties of a particular character static situation rather than following a moving plot then this book is for you. If not, then I believe I did you a huge favor by reading and summarizing it so that you don’t have to.

Average Rating: 3.5/10

Rating System:
Plot Development: 2/10
Character Development: 3/10
Originality: 5/10
Format: 1/10
Complexity: 6/10
Humor: 4/10