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46 of 46 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Jackie Style lush but lacking., August 1, 2001
This review is from: Jackie Style (Hardcover)
I was attracted to this book by its feel and the promise of learning more about that certain "something" Jackie radiates. After mentally debating the price, my lust for more Jackie style information won out and I purchased it. It is a substantial book in many ways but weak in others. The beginning of the book is awkward as the author describes what Jackie was thinking after her husband won the Presidency. How could the author know? The authors assumptions immediately made me question the rest of the books authenticity. As I read through the book however, the author changed tactics and began to describe the first lady using research that was factually supported. She discusses Jackie's upbringing, her role as young woman, and beyond. Though most of the information has been written about before, several aspects were elaborated on to add a new twist and make them more interesting. For example, I had read many times about Jackie winning Vogue magazines Prix de Paris competition, but never in the detail Keough gives. There are a number of photographs in the book but unfortunatly the way they are presented lacks impact. Many are black and white, others small for the page, few are new, and in general they don't have the luster that they could. For example, p.182 has a full size, black and white photograph of Jackie with flowers fully covering her face. If this is one of the never seen photographs Keough promises well I can see why. Another page is devoted to a full color photo of Ari Onasis. Since the full color photos of Jackie are few why not make it one of her? Pamela Keoughs previous book Audrey Style had a much better selection of pictures that made an impression! There are also some line sketches of Jackie in a pillbox. The sketch looks more like Anjelica Houston. The information in the book is broad. The author has obviously done alot of research and she relays the information with her fresh perspective. But many readers will wish for more information about Jackie's STYLE not her life history. For those just beginning to read about Jackie this will be a good introduction but to those familiar with her and the books about her this will be a rehash and retelling.
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63 of 66 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Nice, but nothing about Jackie's fashion., June 20, 2001
This review is from: Jackie Style (Hardcover)
I think it's great that there are authors like Keogh around. You can tell that she really wants to portray Jackie at her best. But the problem is that this book is written in a cut and paste way, and despite what the dustcover says, there is nothing new and revealing at all. Let me explain more. First of all, this book is called JACKIE STYLE, but it is really just a popcorn biography. Keogh claims that she has new interviews that reveal new insights about Jackie. Well, tell me, how does the designer Cynthia Rowley saying she admired how Jackie dressed reveal new insights into Jackie, the person, the first lady, and everything that Jackie was and became?????? Then, there is the claim that there is over 100 black and white, and color, photos of Jackie that have never been seen before. Not true; with the exception of 25 or less, all have been published before. And the 25 are not of Jackie, but of her friends, or a date, or a Kennedy. This book is written well, but is just isn't about her fashion. There are good photos in the bood, and Keogh does have an inviting writing style, even if she tends to sometimes overpraise her subjects, but it is not about Jackie's style.
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23 of 29 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
OVERPRICED and DULL, DULL, DULL a COMPLETE WASTE of TIME..., May 5, 2001
This review is from: Jackie Style (Hardcover)
Beginning with the BORING Mark Shaw Official White House photograph chosen for the cover of this book, it was clear that this book would be a mere regurgetation of facts about Mrs. Onassis culled from the same old, same old tedious sources, which, after Valentino's introduction, suffice to say, was all downhill. Purporting to be a book devoted to Mrs. Onassis' style, I kept waiting for it to begin, which it NEVER did...instead, we are "treated" to Ms. Keogh's interpretation of some genuine facts, along with the usual misinterpretations, gossip, speculation, pop-psychology babble, interjected here and there with the odd statement of those Mrs. Onassis counted as supposed friends or what have you, often presented as an "interview" conducted especially for this book, more like the typical "soundbite" to which modern pop biography is routinely subjected. The editorial content of this book is more or less a in the genre of the High School Term-Paper and was a bore from beginning to end...no revelations or anything insightful found here, at all. Equally disappointing to me was her absurdly limited use of widely seen images of Mrs. Onassis, who for thirty-five (35) years of her life, particularly with John F. Kennedy's ascendancy to The White House, remained THE most famous woman in the world, (a full generation before Diana, Princess of Wales)begging the question, with all of the hordes of photographers stalking Mrs. Onassis throughout her adult life, WHERE ARE THE PHOTOGRAPHS, did all the photographers participate in a bonfire somewhere???!!! For goodness sakes, Ron Galella, who stalked her for years, published a book of his select images of her in 1974. To this end it is odd when Ms. Keogh herself makes mention of Mrs. Onassis's most famous woman in the world status, yet serves-up such banal use of imagery for public consumption, one can't help but think it was just the compensation she would recieve on the wave of her similar book devoted to Audrey Hepburn. Skip this one folks, there are better books devoted to her style, some old and out of print, while others quite recent, such as "Jacqueline Kennedy In The White house" a paperback from 1963; "The Kennedy White House Parties" by Anne Lincoln, published by Viking in 1967; 'my Life With Jacqueline Kennedy", by her former Secretary, Mary B. Gallagher, 1969; "Jacqueline Kennedy: The White House Years" the ONLY book published largely from Mrs. Onassis's recollections and direction, by Mary V. R. Thayer, published in 1971 by Little Brown & Co; "A Thousand Days of Magic: Dressing Jacqueline Kennedy for The White House" by her Official Couturier, Oleg Cassini; "In The Kennedy Style", by her former Social Secretary, Letitia Baldridge; and this year's two (2) better volumes..."Jacqueline Kennedy: The White House Years" the catalogue for the current exhibition mounted by the Costume Institute at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in conjunction with The John F. Kennedy Library; and the just released "Jackie: The Clothes of Camelot" by Jay Mulvaney a book that is just plain fun, appealing, and visually enjoyable, if not as thorough as one might have hoped, but his enthusiasm for his subject along with his sense-of-humour, make this the missing link so obviously lacking within "Jackie Style"!!!! Wait for "Jackie Style" to hit the bargain stacks, I wish she had compensated me for reading it!!!
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