Hypocrite in a Pouffy White Dress (Paperback)

~ (Author) "WHEN I WAS LITTLE, I was so girlie and ambitious, I was practically a drag queen..." (more)
Key Phrases: New York, Mick Jagger, Puerto Rican (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Gilman's memoir of growing up on Manhattan's upper Upper West Side in the '70s starts slowly but gathers momentum. Readers who find themselves drifting during Gilman's reveries on lying during show-and-tell will find themselves pleasantly riveted by the time she's getting in touch with her roots as a reporter for the Jewish Week. Gilman, author of 2001's Kiss My Tiara, a women's self-help guide, makes common scenarios fresh with humor and wry social commentary; on the first day of school, she quickly learns "boys might be fighters, but girls could be terrorists." Gilman's ear for dialogue is dead-on. When her brother asks their dad why their Jewish family celebrates Christmas, she doesn't miss a beat: " 'Because your grandmother's a Communist and your mother loves parties,' said my father. 'Now eat your supper.' " These one-liners don't detract, however, from a serious and moving look at one family's efforts to keep itself intact through divorce and other life challenges. After her parents separate, Gilman, then in her mid-20s, fears she and her brother had spent their childhoods in happy oblivion while their parents were "spellbound with misery." Probably not: Gilman's recollections of moving bumpily toward adulthood are keenly observant. She's nicely made the leap from self-help to narrative nonfiction.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From School Library Journal

Adult/High School–Gilman has a gift for showing the humor in the ordinary. Her memoir takes readers from her childhood in the late 1960s and early '70s through adulthood and marriage. As the book opens, she is reminiscing about the summer of 1969 when she was four and her parents took her to a commune where one of their friends was filming a documentary. She got to personify innocence by dancing naked on the beach with other children. Other experiences include the challenges of being the only Jewish girl attending a private Presbyterian school, her mother's enthusiasm for transcendental meditation, and her own infatuation (and ultimate meeting) with Mick Jagger. Set against the backdrop of New York's Upper West Side, her descriptions of the insecurities that plagued her as an adolescent ring with truth. Gilman's narrative illustrates how the highs and lows that mark the teen years are remarkably similar among generations, and suggests that perhaps the gap isn't so wide after all. As she shares some of her adult experiences–career choices, the effects of her parents' divorce after she and her brother were grown, a work-related trip to the Polish concentration camps–her refreshing blend of humor and frankness does not trivialize the significance of her observations. Gilman's is not an extraordinary life, but she offers a view of American culture over the past 35 years that is compelling and highly readable.–Kim Dare, Fairfax County Public Library System, VA
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 368 pages
• Publisher: Grand Central Publishing (January 1, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0446679496
• ISBN-13: 978-0446679497
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (65 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #304,576 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

29 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Quirky, irreverent and funny memoir, January 2, 2005

By	K. Corn "reviewer" (Indianapolis,, IN United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 100 REVIEWER)

Susan Jane Gilman went along for the ride (sometimes kicking and screaming inside) but never really bought into her parent's eccentric lifestyle. Instead of sticking out like a sore thumb (her parents were not only liberal but their idea of a vacation was a week at a Socialist retreat), she yearned only to be "like everyone else", even if that meant living a conventional, even bland, lifestyle. Her dreams were those of typical little girls of the time - to become a ballerina or, perhaps (with luck and the right breaks) a movie star.
But if she HAD lived a more conventional life, I doubt Gilman would ever had turned out a book so funny, so unique and...well, written from an outsider's perspective. Gilman realizes some of her dreams and drops some along the way. She writes about sex, love, work and that elusive "pouffy white dress" in a vivid, endearing style. By the time you reach the end of the book, you'll be yearning for more from this writer.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Wise and Witty Memoir , January 22, 2005

By	Bookreporter.com (New York, New York) - See all my reviews

There are actually a lot of pouffy white dresses in Susan Jane Gilman's achingly funny memoir, HYPOCRITE IN A POUFFY WHITE DRESS. There's the tutu she insists on wearing to school, sparking a kindergarten fashion trend. There are her Puerto Rican neighbors' first communion dresses, which make young Susan "spastic with envy" and determined to become Hispanic. And last but not least, there's the pouffy white dress of the title story, the wedding dress that inspires a revision in Gilman's feminist sensibilities: "I was supposed to be the Anti-Bride ... I was not some insipid girlie-girl dolled up like a parade float. But in that dress, with the tiara, I was intoxicated with myself."

Gilman's revelations on the pedestal at David's Bridal are a lot like her memoir as a whole: simultaneously funny, thoughtful and unexpected. For example, when she lands her first "real" job after college at the Jewish Week newspaper, Gilman is assigned to report on a week-long tour for teenagers of Polish Holocaust sites. Initially pleased simply to call herself a "foreign correspondent," Gilman, who is at most ambivalent toward her Jewish heritage, gradually finds herself deeply moved by the concentration camps. Even though she eloquently describes the trip's unexpectedly emotional impact, Gilman also includes a genuinely funny commentary on the souvenirs available at the Treblinka gift shop.

Gilman was previously best known for the wisecracking dating manual KISS MY TIARA, an alternative to bestselling 1990s women's advice books like THE RULES. She notes in her foreword that part of the goal of this book is to write a "coming-of-age" story that doesn't focus solely on getting a man. "There's so much more to women's lives that's worthy of attention and ridicule," she writes. And indeed, Gilman's memoir will have the most appeal for other young(ish) women, who will see themselves in Gilman's own awkward adolescence and questionable career development, as well as in her struggles to define herself in the wake of the feminist movement. Anyone from Gilman's generation, though --- born in the 1960s, raised on the pop culture and pop psychology of the 1970s --- will laugh out loud at the cultural references Gilman sprinkles liberally throughout her memoir.

HYPOCRITE IN A POUFFY WHITE DRESS starts with Gilman's preschool years and ends in 2001, as she begins a new phase of her life --- happily married and living in Geneva, Switzerland. One can only hope that Gilman will continue to chronicle this next chapter of her life in books as smart and funny as this one.

--- Reviewed by Norah Piehl

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars I wanted so badly to not like this book...., January 13, 2006

By	kjgrow (Brooklyn, NY) - See all my reviews

but I couldn't help it, Susan Jane won me over.

Yes, this is a collection of irreverent personal essays, a category terribly overpublished and often pointless, but Gilman's voice emerges (in most pieces) as an authentic one. Nothing really extraordinary happens in these coming-of-age vignettes. The author quits a job, loses a job, lives abroad, finds love, repeatedly makes a fool of herself and/or puts her foot in her mouth - all fodder for pretty average memoir material. But Gilman's storytelling is so compelling, her eye for detail and the absurdities of life so acute, that somehow this ends up being an overall satisfying read. A few of the pieces do fall flat (the title piece particularly so), and Gilman occasionally slips into quick bouts of navel-gazing or juvenile obnoxiousness. But her writing is solid, her approach is well-intentioned, and she can be especially illuminating on difficult topics like the foibles of family life and contemporary feminism.