| Title | : | The Secret Lives of Dresses |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0340993235 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780340993231 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 384 |
| Publication | : | First published January 1, 2011 |
Let me tell you mine...’
Dora is in love with a man who barely notices her, has a job she doesn’t care about, and dresses entirely for comfort, not style. All a far cry from her vivid, eccentric childhood, growing up with her beloved grandmother Mimi.
However, when disaster strikes, Dora knows she has no choice but to return to her childhood home and take over running Mimi’s vintage clothing shop. And there she makes a surprising discovery – Mimi’s been writing stories to accompany every dress she sells. Romantic, heartbreaking tales about each one’s secret life before it got to her shop...
Dora starts to matchmake these lonely frocks with new owners, but will the stories help her as well? Trading her boring high street clothes for vintage glamour is one thing. What she needs to know is whether she can trade her safe old life – and love – for something better too?
A captivating and enchanting novel for every girl who knows that the right dress can change your life. By the author of the popular blog www.dressaday.com.
The Secret Lives of Dresses Reviews
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This book had so much potential and I really wanted to love it since the premise was so charming and the cover is so cute.
The book is called ‘The Secret Life of Dresses’ because many dresses sold in the main character’s grandmother’s boutique contain a story from the dress’s point of view. This is a cute idea, however, the stories seemed random and didn’t go anywhere. I thought that each story was going to lead back to a real life event in her grandmothers life, but that didn’t happen and it seemed like a missed opportunity.
There were also a ton of flashbacks that got confusing to keep track of and the chapters were so long that I hardly could finish one in a sitting. (That’s probably why it took me over a month to read this book.)
Small spoiler:
There was a scene that the grandmother had an emergency situation while in the hospital. I didn’t realize until chapters later that she died during said situation. It wasn’t expressed that this caused her to die until I started to read about funeral arrangements.
It was a cute read and very innocent in nature, but I was hoping for more about the dresses and style and working in the boutique and what I got more of was drama with boys and family problems.
Not entirely for me.
3 ⭐️ -
This was a cute little book. I could easily see it as a movie. I don't think of it as a general 'chick-lit' book though. I loved the secret stories about the vintage dresses. The romance was fresh and cute and yet sweet and 'old fashioned.' Just a great little book!
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3.5 Stars
I love vintage clothing and hats! On my closet shelf, many sassy hats from the 30s, 40s, and 50s sit in protective bags while a few prized dresses and suit pieces hang on wooden hangers waiting for the right occasion to be worn. A couple of been thrown out: the yellow sun-dress that witnessed my son’s father breaking my heart. I haven’t worn yellow since. The Aqua jumpsuit witnessed my humiliation – I got fired from my broadcasting job. My kids News Telecast had been cancelled. There is no aqua or light blues in my closet either. Hopefully, they had better lives with the women who bought them from the Goodwill Thrift Shop, since Mimi Winston’s quaint shop only lives on the printed page.
Dora Winston had grown up in that dress shop in Forsyth, North Carolina. She loved those dresses just as much as Mimi does, but not enough to wear them. She is attending a medium sized Liberal Arts college a few hundred miles from Forsyth, majoring in what else, Liberal Arts. She is going through the motions of growing up. She has no clue of who she is and what to do with her life with the exception of going to grad school to further study Liberal Arts. And just maybe land her charming boss, Gary, who has a strict policy of not dating undergraduates. But best laid plans, even vague ones will go awry. Dora gets a phone call and is told that her Mimi has had a stroke. She literally drops everything (including her apron and I pod) at the coffee shop she manages and drives home to Forsyth.
Arriving home, a still crying Dora falls into the comfort of Gabby’s arms. Gabby, Mimi’s quirky distant relative and house guest whom never left after her third divorce, sends Dora upstairs to change before driving her to the hospital to see her grandmother. Knowing Mimi would never accept seeing her grand-daughter in tattered cargo shorts and clogs, Dora carefully selects a day dress and loafers from her closet. Mimi had been saving many dresses from the vintage store for her throughout the years. Upon seeing Mimi lying in the hospital bed attached to various machines, Dora is both shocked and frightened. Mimi had raised her alone since she was a baby, because a tragic accident claimed the lives of both of her parents.
Dora decides the best way to help Mimi and to diminish the shock of seeing a frail old women lying in the hospital is to run the dress shop. Quickly Dora finds solace among the vintage clothing and accidentally learns that some of the dresses have secret lives, vignettes presumably written by her grandmother. She follows Mimi’s dictates and wears the vintage dresses and is surprised that she is comfortable in them. She also finds comfort in Maux (Mimi’s saucy part-time employee) and Mimi’s young builder friend, Con Murphy. But when Margaret Winston dies a couple of weeks later, Dora finds herself at odds with her greedy Aunt Camile and Uncle John. Mimi has left the shop to John and Camile is going to transform the shop into a modern, gaudy tourist clothing emporium. Dora decides to fight for the shop. She means to keep Mimi’s original vision and create “secret lives” for each dress that will be sold under her management.
The strengths of the book are the vignettes of the dresses. My favorite were of the dress that was made for dancing and of the day dress that played in muddy puddles with the wearer’s young children. The characters are strong (Mimi’s character is developed through appropriate placed flashbacks) and likable. I adored Gabby and Maux and despised Camile and Tyffanee as was intended. Con left me wanting to know more about him.
However the weaknesses of Erin McKeon’s debut novel prevents a 5 Star rating. Many questions were left hanging. Why didn’t Mimi tell Dora about her parents? Why didn’t Dora ask about them? What prompted Dora to gravitate to older men? Con is close to 30 and Gary is 30. The love-triangle subplot was week as was Dora Winston’s coming of age story. Two weeks of rapid character growth, after 20 years of listless rebellion? Why hadn’t Mimi provided for Dora and changed her Will? In my opinion, these weaknesses made the distinction from a great story to a delightful 3.5 Star first novel. -
The best word I can use to describe this book is “vanilla”. It’s enjoyable, in that I read through 100 pages without realizing it, but ultimately boring and forgettable. I wasn’t attached to any of the characters, and none of them really had a distinct personality. Dora showed some spunk, but not enough for me to feel any emotional attachment to her, and I don’t feel like she grew at all as a character. It was the same with the plot; it plodded along slowly, but nothing ever really happened. Even the secret lives of the dresses weren’t really explored.
There were a few things that really annoyed me about the book though. First, the vagueness of details. By the end of the book, I still didn’t have a clear idea of what any of the characters really looked like (hair color? eye color? body type?). The ages of the characters were an issue too. At the beginning of the novel, it’s stated that Dora hasn’t been home for four years, but then the author also says that Dora is 20 - so, she moved out of her house when she was 16? That doesn’t sound right. Also, what time of year is this book taking place? Summer is mentioned, but then so is Halloween. But then again, it’s warm outside, but the leaves are changing color. I appreciate attention to tiny details like those because it makes the world in the book a little bit more real. -
I adored this book. Light and fluffy, until it wasn't, but then it wrapped you up in a vintage pashmina and made you feel loved and happy all over again. Read it if you love vintage clothing, and well made clothes and families. Read it if your family isn't quite made like other families but you still grew up surrounded by love and biscuits.
The perfect rainy day read. -
I read this book a while ago and just, well, I forgot completely about it. This is the story of a lost college girl who is in love in love with her uber-flirty boss at the college coffee shop. Dora is smart, organized, and one assumes pretty. But she’s the 90s chick flick kind of pretty where she doesn’t know it and neither do the boys because she dresses all frumpy. She was raised by her grandmother, Mimi, in a microscopic town where Mimi owned and operated a vintage clothing store. Adorable. Even more adorable—Mimi puts aside items from the store that she thinks would look good on Dora. So much, in fact, that the girl has an entire room of her grandmother’s house designated as her closet. An entire room full of adorable dresses. That she never wears. And, as a former college student, I get maybe not wearing them all the time, but at least for Halloween. Or going out on Saturday night. Ugh.
So, anyway, Mimi gets sick. Like, in a comma in the hospital sick, so Dora sprints home and takes care of…the store. And then a “love triangle” ensues. But it is the kind of love triangle that annoys me because it is not really a love triangle—more like an unrequited love mess. Blech. So, Mimi has been talking Dora up to super tall, hot, smart (and presumably too old) Con, a construction worker? So before he even meets Dora, he is in love with her. And then she starts wearing those dresses all the time because she was in too much of a hurry to get from college to Mimi’s hospital bed (which she pretty much avoids) to pack even her toothbrush. But, she’s still in love with whiny, stupid, idiotic coffee shop boss, who is a super flirty grad student. And if Dora only becomes a grad student, too, they can date, because he won’t date an undergrad. Also, he is an idiot and she has basically been doing his job for him. I mean, the boy can’t even handle ordering supplies.
So, anyway, Con (who I’m assuming is at least 35) is all in love with her, and because she is wearing all of those dresses because she was too stupid to pack, she looks like Mimi and he keeps on commenting about how she reminds him of Mimi. I’m pretty sure that he was in love with Mimi but Mimi was too old, so he is going for the baby granddaughter. So he keeps taking her to see Mimi and then out to eat or bowling or on other assorted dates and he’s all nice and “when my dad died…blah blah blah” which is sweet, but she doesn’t seem to understand that he is courting her until, like, the seventh date. Awkward.
As if this is not enough of the plot, her grandmother’s brother’s wife and her blonde sorority stock-character daughter decide to take over the store and ruin it. I could have done without all of that. I feel like it moved me from feeling sorry for the little dear to thinking that the author was trying too hard to make me feel sorry for Dora.
Oh! Oh! And, to make matters worse, the secret lives of dresses, the namesake of the book, were short stories that Mimi wrote about the dress’s former life. They were SO BORING. I ended-up skipping them after a while.
This was pretty standard chick-lit, but a bit of a letdown. I really liked the idea of the novel, so I was quite disappointed that the secret lives ended-up being lame and that the descriptions of vintage clothing were so…nondescript. But, for a quick no-brainer read, it will suffice. -
The Secret Lives of Dresses is best described as "cute" and "fun." The dresses are described well and when you get to the actual "lives" of the dresses, they are all quite interesting.
However, the human characters fall short of the dresses. Dora, the main character, is a lost, drifting college student with no aim in life. When her grandmother (who raised her) falls ill, Dora drops everything to go home. Seriously, she drops everything: school, her job, her life, her clothes, her identity.
After Dora arrives home, she realizes that she has no clothes with her. But wait! Grandmother Mimi, who runs a vintage clothing shop, has saved an entire room's-worth of clothing for Dora in case she one day decided to up and begin wearing vintage dresses, shoes, and even underwear after a lifetime of wearing jeans and t-shirts. Dora reluctantly wears one of the dresses since she has no other clothes with her, and she sort of likes it. This begins Dora's transformation into a completely different person. Eventually Dora wears these vintages outfits all of the time, and somehow her personality shifts and makes her into a woman with drive, with a purpose. She suddenly begins to see that the man she has a crush on (who she was willing to go to graduate school for the sole purpose of being able to date) is an immature moron, and the man she just met several days ago is the bees knees. How? Dresses, I guess.
Dora, about halfway through the book, finds out that some of the dresses in Mimi's shop come with a "secret life." These are small stories about the dresses, from the point of view of the dresses, inserted into the book. The secret lives feel far more compelling than the main story.
The other characters are the requisite "kooky aunt figure" and "mean, spiteful relatives who are there to give the main character something to hate."
The one character who felt was the most real was Mimi, and, due to her illness, she's not actually even in the book in action, yet through the descriptions from other characters, Mimi's personality comes alive.
The book's ending is terribly predictable and somewhat abrupt. The last few sentences are especially cheesy and feel seriously out of place with the rest of the book's dialogue. -
I didn't think I would like this book very much... the title was the only thing that did capture me, but it must of done something at sometime for me to pick up and purchase... but I was after something lighter to read and also to try not to read a book in a series.
The Secret Lives of Dresses by
Erin McKean was a surprising delight to read. Dora heads back to her childhood home when her grandmother is hit by a stroke and in a coma. Dora takes over running her grandmothers vintage clothing store to keep things going and to keep focused and not worry.
It is a coming of age story - as Dora figures out her next moves in her life, rekindles her own passion for life, and learns the true essence of love is.
While it was an easy, relaxing read, I did struggle with some of the characters including Dora - and I feel they didn't have a lot of depth to them really, a lot of surface information - like Shrek said - 'Ogres have layers' - I felt the characters were missing their layers.
overall 3 stars - was a pleasant read. -
This book is such a sweet treasure. I really enjoyed each of the characters, especially Dora. I loved how the vintage clothing became characters as well with their own stories.
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Quick summary: bleh.
This story starts out well enough. Dora, college student nearing her graduation, must return home when the grandmother who raised her suffers a stroke. Dora ends up running her grandmother’s vintage dress shop as she tries to decide what to do with her life. She discovers that her grandmother has been writing “secret lives” for many of the vintage dresses that she gives out to the customers who buy the dresses.
I liked the idea for the book, but I didn’t really think it was well executed. I think this is the author’s first novel and it feels very amateurish at times.
I initially picked this book up because I wanted something light and entertaining to read on an airplane. However light this book was, it really missed the mark in terms of entertainment. If it hadn’t been such a fast read, I might not have finished it.
While I had been intrigued by the “secret lives” of the dresses, I actually found those stories to be boring and a jarring element within the book because the dress stories are told as if the dress is an animate object that is telling you a story. It didn't work for me at all.
I liked the main character enough, but overall I felt like the characters were flat and didn’t draw me in. It seems unfair to call it a bad book. It was just really mediocre. -
I read thirty pages of this book, just to try and give it a chance. But no, I won't be reading anymore.
I understand the book is based on a blog, and I guess the idea of the stories behind the dresses is a good one. Probably quite interesting.
The framing device of the novel is not interesting. Dora seems weird from the get go, because after running out on work mid-day and driving non-stop to get to her grandmother, she then stops for a makeover and a shower.
The start of the book is exposition heavy and stodgy, yet doesn't tell us anything important - we don't learn that Dora's parents are dead until she finally arrives at the hospital. Also, because of a clumsy metaphor at the start of the novel, I thought Mimi was already dead - I think it's something like 'the traffic was so heavy, she might already have been dead, and this was her hell' but it was smack bang in a paragraph about Mimi, so I misread it.
I stopped reading because I don't see much depth coming from this story, it's standard teary stuff, but...I can't be bothered to carry on with a featherbrained two-dimensional protagonist for the sake of some blog content that's been reworked. -
Herzwärmende Story mit einer symphatischen Hauptcharakterin. Am Schluss ging alles fast ein bisschen zu schnell über die Bühne, aber sonst fand ich es wirklich eine schöne spannende Geschichte. Als Extra hätte ich noch toll gefunden wenn es kleine Zeichnungen von den Kleidern im Buch gehabt hätte, denn oft konnte ich mir unter den einzelnen Vintagekleidern nichts vorstellen.
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Very nice read! Go to
http://didibooksenglish.wordpress.com/ for a more thorough review. -
I thought I was in the mood for a book like this but turns out I wasn’t. The premise that wearing lovely vintage dresses, instead of shock, horror, cargo pants and a t-shirt, can turn your life around is kind of annoying. As is the whole knight in shining armour or man with a truck/ carpentry skills who saves the day story. Not my cup of tea.
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I love the cover of this book, it drew me in, and I think that even if the blip from the back of the book didn't draw me in I would have had to have read it just because of the cover. Kudos to whom ever chose this design!
Okay, on to the book. I enjoyed the story of Dora but also found a couple of things just a little confusing. I feel like I may have missed something or that it is just missing in the story.
Things I enjoyed about this story. Erin McKean did a great job of telling the reader exactly who Dora was and how she got to where she was in life. Dora grew up in her grandmother's care after her parents died when she was very young and she knows very little about them. She is a college student who has taken the "vagueness of studies" and is working at a coffee shop where she has a crush on her boss, Gary, who only dates graduate students and flirts with everyone, much to Dora's dismay. I felt that I could connect with Dora right away as she is racing home when she finds out her grandmother has suffered a stroke. Needless to say, her life is about to change. While she is home, she starts to wear that clothes that her grandmother has been putting aside for her for years and working in the vintage clothing store her grandmother owns, where she discovers the secret stories her grandmother has written and begun to give out about certain outfits. I love these stories, they are wonderful and painful all at the same time. I love "watching" Dora grow up in this short amount of time while her grandmother is deathly ill.
This is where I get confused. As Dora is working in the shop one day, in come an attractive man named Con, who is a contractor working on the apartment above the store and friends with Dora's grandmother, Mimi. What I cannot figure out is the age of this man. Is he an older man perusing Dora or is he closer in age and was just friendly with Mimi. It is just odd and I could never really figure it out. Anyhow, Con and Dora begin to spend time together and Con helps Dora to deal with the stress of her sick grandmother.
What happens from here has great flow but if I was to say any more it would spoil the book and that would be no fun. I will say that my favorite part of this story was reading the stories that have been written for the different dresses. They are amazing and written from the perspective of the dress itself and what it "sees" and "experiences". I think that this was a great idea it really makes this book unique, which I love! -
I will own up to some anti-chick-lit snobbery. I'm not proud, but there it is. If a book has a picture of women's shoes or clothes on it, or a baby rattle, or whatever, that's a pass for me. So I'm not sure how I ended up with this except it was Friday afternoon and I didn't feel well and I wanted something light to get me through the weekend. I don't think I actually thought, "Please don't be dumb," but we might as well assume I did. Now, having confessed that, I am examining my prejudices.
Because The Secret Lives of Dresses was good. Good like I am reading it concurrently with The Hobbit and I cared a lot more about Dora and Mimi than I do about Bilbo and Gandalf. Because Mimi had a stroke and she's the only parent Dora has ever known. Dora, for her part, is desperately unhappy and desperate not to acknowledge it. So when she returns to her home town to look after Mimi's dress shop, it's high time to turn her life upside down and figure out what she really wants. Spending time in Mimi's shop and learning its secrets is the first, best step.
McKean's writing is light, but in the best of ways, like a delicate, savory popover of a novel. The plot is straightforward to the point of being predictable, but the the titular secrets-- stories about the vintage dresses Dora's Mimi, then Dora sells, keep the story fresh and interesting. Her characterization is wonderful, too. I'm content with the ending but I would absolutely read another novel about Dora, Con, Gabby and especially Maux, whose whole is something that transcends her cliched parts.
In short, I loved it and I absolutely recommend it. I hope you do, too! -
I thought I was going to love this book, and I really wanted to love it. I only liked it. The story is unique (to me anyway). Some of the flashbacks were confusing. I'd be a few sentences in when I'd have to stop and go back because I'd gotten confused so when I'd go back and re-read, it was then that I would realize that it was a flashback. I didn't care for the stories of the dresses. With the exception of the last (and most relevant) one, they were all sad or negative. I would have liked to have seen more positive stories about the dresses. Unless that's what Dora had planned on doing with future stories, but we don't know for sure. I would have liked to have gotten to know Mimi more. I couldn't really relate to Dora very much but I really liked Maux and Con. I absolutley loathed Camille and Tyffanee. I don't know or have to deal with anyone in real life who is THAT overbearing and I don't like having to deal with them in fictional life either.
I will say my major praise for this book is how well it is written. The author is a lexicographer and you can tell with her writing. She knows her words and she knows how to use them. Not only that, she knows how to use them in a very good way. She's not out to impress anyone with her knowledge of words, she simply uses them well and combines them beautifully. I was also thoroughly overjoyed with the editing, as there were no typos! (that is a huge pet peeve of mine with books, especially given our advanced age of technology and spell check these days).
Overall a good book, I'm glad I read it. -
I picked up this book in a second hand book market and thought the concept truly could not get better. I had high hopes. I really really should not have had high hopes. Beyond the concept, the book was pretty meh. After you get over the fact that you can predict the plot from about page 20 and accept the fact its a “feel good” book, you have to realize the “feel good” aspects are not out of this world cute or special. It just didn’t tick any of my boxes. This is not to say it was a bad book- a solid three stars for sure, I’m just a little salty because SO much could have been done with the premise.
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Interesting to see the reviews. Perhaps listening to it via audio is the key. I listened to a Bolinda Audio Recording and now very much looking forward to visiting a vintage store, trying and speculating the secret life of the dress. And If I'm lucky...maybe I'll find the one.
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Fun, different story. Light hearted. Great characters. Some unnecessary f-words. Relatively predictable ending. Very enjoyable quick read.
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The book was very good
Loved the details of the letters about the dresses. -
After finishing A Discovery of Witches earlier in the week, The Secret Lives of Dresses came off as… cute. If I hadn’t just finished a book that threw my entire world for a loop and made me positively itching for the next installment, I would have probably had stronger feelings towards this one, but as it is, I am simply left with the word ‘cute’.
The Secret Lives of Dresses follows Dora, a soon-to-be college graduate, as she copes with her grandmother’s failing health. After hearing about “Mimi’s” stroke, Dora rushes home to be by her side and take over her vintage dress store. As she works in the store, memories of her childhood with Mimi are resurrected, and Dora realizes how lucky she was to have grown up surrounded by her love. She also realizes how little has changed since she left for college: she’s still the aimless, wandering girl of her youth without any idea what to do with her life. While mending clothing, steaming dresses, and organizing the shop, she stumbles upon the “secret lives”: stories from the dresses, full of personality, describing how they were bought, who they lived with, and what they had seen in their lives before coming to the store. In the world she took for granted as a child, Dora begins to blossom into the woman her grandmother always hoped she would be, surprising everyone but Mimi.
Mimi is the kind of mother I aspire to be one day. She is a character with a huge personality, but yet the kind of sweet, compassionate woman you can go to with any trouble in your life. When Dora is sick as a child, Mimi gives her a get-better brooch. When Dora is heartbroken as a teen, Mimi sits her down to watch Audrey Hepburn classics. I found myself writing down quotation after quotation from Mimi because she is such a wealth of knowledge and hard-earned advice.
While Mimi is a great character, some of the others were less developed. In particular, a lot of the villainous characters in the book seemed like they could have been plucked right out of a sitcom or a romantic comedy; they were just there to cause aggravation for the readers. And let me tell you: I was aggravated. There were a few points in my reading that my blood was boiling so much, I had to put the book down and breathe. Dora, while a sweet girl, is spineless and timid, letting people walk all over her. The reader is forced to watch as Dora pines after a womanizing cad of a man and lets him take advantage of her. When distant family members arrive, Dora continues to play the role of doormat, and I just wanted to leap right into the pages of the book and give them all a stern talking-to.
Thankfully, when Dora begins to blossom towards the end of the book, she finds her backbone again and becomes a more likable character. That’s not to say that she isn’t likable during the rest of the book, just a little too meek for my taste.
One thing I particularly liked about this book was the ending. It’s worth reading just for the little gem on the last few pages. It also has a pretty good epilogue. I’m not a big fan of the things myself, but this one pretty accurately summed everything up for me.
This is a book I would recommend for romantic comedy lovers. It was a sweet, endearing book, but nothing particularly special. While an enjoyable read, it certainly isn’t one I would consider re-reading in the future. It’s safe. Happy, cute, and safe. -
I asked for this book because it looked interesting and I thought it would be a cute read. Little did I know that I would fall in love with the characters and get so emotional while reading it. The Secret Lives of Dresses is an absolutely fabulous read: you have such great description of the vintage dresses, mixed with the crazy emotions that an unexpected romance can bring and add a little dash of humour and voila you have the perfect story for a hopeless romantic like myself. There were also some great pop culture references for my age group: The Princess Bride and Buffy! How did Ms. McKean know to mix those into the story at just the right times?
I absolutely loved Dora from the start. She has a great sense of humour and a longing to be loved, but seems to fall for the wrong guys. It's wonderful to see her grow, learn what she wants to do with her life and be so brave and courageous to fight for what she believes in. I don't think she really knew what she wanted to do until she came back to the dress shop. It's like she has found the sense of home that she was looking for all along. Add in a seriously cute and dreamy contractor, a quirky and eclectic store clerk, a gossipy elderly friend and you have a recipe for some great reading.
The best part of the entire novel was reading the secret lives of the dresses. As each dress was sold from the store a secret life was given away with it. They were so eloquently written and honestly I wish there were pictures of the dresses to go with the stories, though the author does do a great job with describing the different dress styles throughout the book. It actually makes you want to go find your fanciest dress and get all dolled up for the afternoon just to wonder what your dress would say about you or where it had been before.
I have already recommended this book to a few of my friends and will be sending my copy off to my best friend for her to read, because I know it is right up her alley. I already know that I will be buying a finished copy of this book when it comes out in February. It is going to be added to my favourites list. -
This was really cute and somehow really quite sad at the same time and somehow the contrast worked well for me.
Dora is an intelligent young woman who is graduating early from college, secretly in love with her boss and completely clueless about what she wants to do with her life until it all crashes down around her when she gets a phonecall that the grandmother who raised her has had a stroke and is badly ill in hospital. Dora goes home and it's there that she kinda grows into herself.
I won't lie - there are all sorts of cliches here, but it worked for me and they were cliches, but they were well executed ones? Idk how to explain it - in the real world, a change of attitude and a handsome architect don't just drop into your lap during life's tragedies but it never felt, to me, that it was ridiculous. When Dora swapped her regular clothes for the vintage wardrobe her gran had kept for her, I was happy for her to have that bond with her, as opposed to annoyed. I'd probably find it all annoying in another book or if I read it at another time, but this book at this moment? It all worked for me. I just wish there were a sequel. -
I'm surprising myself with the 4 stars and can't explain why. It's more a 3.5 I suppose, but I did enjoy it overall. I think it helped me to not have any idea what the book was about before I read it. I didn't read the blurb I just picked it up and read it - no expectations. The title was mildly intriguing and I'd looked past it on my (ebook) bookshelf for a few years before finally reaching for (clicking on!) it.
I enjoyed the storyline and the quirky characters. I loved the idea of the secret lives (although have to admit skim-reading some of them as they were a bit long). I really liked Nora but am not sure exactly what I liked about her. Perhaps her potential; her inability to see what she wanted in life and therefore the excitement of being able to watch her figure it out.
The day after I finished it I chose a nice dress and heels over jeans and sandshoes. Maybe that's why I chose 4 stars :) -
I'm going to coin a new genre called "orphaned girl with quarterlife-crisis return home to ailing/lonely/dead grandmother and rediscover themselves amongst a pile of the grandmothers cache (clothes, books...) as well as snag a cute hometown boy who falls hopeless in love with the new-to-town girl."
On occasion, I do like these books, especially those that add a dash of whimsy (many deal with cooking) but I found this book contrived and soap-operay. It'd be good for a day at the beach and a book to leave in the train for someone else to find. Beyond that there was so much that could have improved this novel, it went in so many directions, the characters were predictable and often incredibly annoying.
It's definitely not worth spending full-price on this book. -
Like a Lifetime Movie
But better because books are always better than film. The characters in this book are interesting but the dresses secret lives make the story. Hopefully there will be a prequel someday telling Mimi's story. Overall a fun read. -
Chick-Lit twaddle is what I'm tempted to say. Predictable plot, little character development, fast-paced dialogue, all the earmarks of commercial fiction, but the best ones. So, in this case, a stylish Audrey Hepburn chick lit. Fun, fast, beach read (even though I'm not at the beach; I'm quarantined in a pandemic).
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I must say the stories about the secret lives of the dresses really made this book for me. Otherwise, the characters were flat, the storyline predictable.
This was the October selection for one of my book clubs.
