Customer Reviews

Miss Julia's School of Beauty

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Miss Julia, that spitfire of a widow from North Carolina, has gone and eloped with lawyer Sam Murdoch. Avid readers of this series will remember that Sam pursued Julia at every turn, and she was too close to see his attention for what it was. She's still not sure about his intentions, even though they're now married -- or are they? Seems the minister they ran to in Tennessee wasn't ordained by a legal church. Ooops! So Julia and Sam are in trouble, as are a few dozen other couples and a famous country singer whose wedding-gone-awry story appears in a supermarket tabloid.

That's only the minor storyline here. The big news is that Hazel Marie is planning a local beauty contest, and to that end she enlists the help of Miss Julia and her nemesis, Etta Mae Wiggins. The six contestants must be taught how to walk, talk, dress, and make themselves appealing to the audience and the three judges. Hazel Marie and Etta Mae do most of the work with the girls, so no formal School of Beauty exists. But to Miss Julia's credit, she takes the most needy contestant under her wing and does pretty well with her. And the pageant is a success.

Other readers may think this episode is somehow lacking, but I laughed out loud more than once at Miss Julia's observations and succinct assessments. Her constant appraisal of everything that comes her way is one of her endearing qualities. She *does* need to calm down where Sam is concerned and simply trust that he is indeed a good man who is hopelessly devoted to her. Perhaps time will tell in that respect.

An entertaining read with memorable characters.

Miss Julia and Sam Murdoch have eloped to the Smoky Mountains and have had a family honeymoon at Dollywood. Unfortunately, there seems to be some doubt as to whether the wedding chapel preacher is really qualified to perform weddings. Since proper behavior is #1 with Miss Julia, she tells Sam that they must have separate quarters until the marriage mystery is cleared up. Meanwhile Hazel Marie, Miss Julia's erstwhile housemate, is involved in a beauty pageant which will raise money for the sheriff's department. She, Miss Julia, and the flirtatious Etta Mae Wiggins, are in charge of the pageant and the contestants, a rag-tag group of six girls which present a real challenge to their mentors. This book is not quite as much fun as its predecessors in the series, because of Miss Julia's unfounded concerns about Sam's fidelity and whether he truly wants to be married to her. Otherwise, it's the usual romp with the characters which have become to beloved in the other books.

While I enjoyed this latest "Miss Julia" novel, some of the aspects of the series are getting a little old. For instance, Julia's tendenancy to jump to conclusions and get herself into a completely misdirected tizzy is starting to feel farfetched and tiresome. As is the meddling of her "friends" and neighbors. When Julia's friend, Luanne Conover, wants to throw Julia and Sam a wedding celebration and Julia refuses, Luanne chews her up one side and down the other. I cannot believe that anyone would put up with it the way Julia does. And the day my pastor aimed his sermon at me specifically would be the day I found another church. For such a strong, opinionated character, Julia sure lets people run rough-shod over her.
The premise of "School of Beauty" is that Hazel Marie is organizing a beauty pagent to help raise funds for the sheriff's department. Miss Julia is brought in to help the contestants with deportment. The second story line is that the validity of Julia's and Sam's marriage is called into question when it surfaces that the minister who performed the ceremony in Pigeon Forge, TN might not be authorized by the state to officiate. Of course, this causes problems for our ever proper Miss Julia as she goes into full panic mode about "living in sin" (another far-fetched notion...I mean, we are in the 21st century and no one will sew a scarlet A to her blouse). All I can say is, God bless Sam for putting up with her.
All in all, it was a good book, but the character of Miss Julia isn't continuing to evolve into the strong, independent woman I hoped she'd be. She still cares too much about what others think and still allows their opinions to dictate her actions.

Wow, for a series which started off with a strong independent older female character, Miss Julia has really really let herself go. I knew it would be the 'kiss of death' for Julia to get married, (this time to 'too good to be true' Sam Murdoch), and I'm sad to say I was right. Miss Julia's problems in this book are all in her head. Her silly dithering about her marriage, her jealous obsession over Sam and other women and her silly worrying about whether she is married or not, are so unlike the practical sensible widow, I have to sigh.

I'm sorry to say it, but if Miss Ross is to revitalize the series, she'd need to do something drastic. Such as A: Dump Sam (sorry, never liked the character. Miss Julia needs a bad boy, not a saint), B: do something about the Mr. Pickens situation, C: and get something *real* for Miss Julia to worry about rather than herself. When I saw the title of this book, I thought Miss Julia *might* be getting herself a new hobby. Unfortunately, the title is misleading.

Might be worth picking up at the library, but definitely the worst in the series. I was *so* disappointed.

I love books about Southern women. Usually they are interesting and fun to read. When I picked this book up from a bargain table, I thought I was getting a book I would enjoy. At that time I didn't know this was a series, so when I started reading it, I decided to order two more of her books. Hopefully, they will be better than this one. This book is a total waste of time. Miss Julia makes a mountain out of ever molehill, and a problem that drags on for 300 pages could have been solved easy as pie. Miss Julia and her new husband Sam learn that the preacher in Pidgeon Forge, Tenn. might not have been a real preacher, and they might not be legally married. That's the problem. All they would have had to do was find a real preacher and get it done legally, which is what Sam wanted to do, but Miss Julia comes up with every excuse in the book not to get married again, all the while moaning and groaning that she and Sam are living in sin. The whole premise was so stupid that I'm sorry I ordered the other two books. I just hope they are better than this one. This one is awful.

This is the 6th installment in the Miss Julia series. All our favorite characters are here and as usual Miss Julia is in a jam! As alway it's entertaining to see what lengths she'll go to trying to keep her secrets! Maybe not the best of the series, but still fun.

I love these books and this one was just as good as the others. Miss Julia is sweet and hilarious as she realizes that she may not legally be married to Sam. She cracks me up! The author uses great illustrations to interest the reader and as usual I couldn't put it down until I finished it.

Disclaimer: I listened to the unabridged audio, rather than reading the print version.

For those who haven't read this one, I'll try to keep the spoiling to a minimum. However, the "beauty" aspect is secondary to the main (drawn out!) premise: Julia and Sam's marriage license appears to be invalid. I was very turned off by Julia's priggishness about sexual activity after that comes into play. There were allusions to plenty during their honeymoon at Dollywood, so why is that OK, but later is not? I couldn't begin to buy into Miss Julia's obesession on that.
The "beauty" angle concerns Hazel Marie's running a beauty contest for Miss Abbott County Sheriff - specifically, Julia's desire to help one of the six contestants. That serves as a sort of counterpoint to her internal moaning about being a fornicator.
I agree that Sam is too "good" for her; they make better friends. Mr. Pickens is fine with me though as is. Even Julia opines that as he has three failed marriages behind him, Hazel Marie might be better off as his significant other than as ex-wife #4.
Cynthia Darlow has taken over the narrator slot from Karen White, as the author has switched audio production companies. Ms. Darlow is pretty good with the "Dearest Dorothy" series, but Miss Julia herself often sounds more like she's from New York than North Carolina.
I strongly recommend fans who want to read this as the latest installment either get it from the library, or buy a used copy. Not worth the price of a new one.
On a more postive note, the plot of the forthcoming book - was Wesley Lloyd really Little Lloyd's father? - seems like something much better for Julia to get all worked up over.

What's happened to our Miss Julia? What happened to the woman of strong opinions who never backed down from a fight? What happened to the woman who was *too* sure of herself? I never got the impression from the earlier books that Miss Julia would ever again let herself get so dependent on a man that she would lose all sense of herself, but that's what's happens in this book. Now that she and Sam are married (well, sort of, anyway), you would think that she would KNOW that Sam loves her. He's certainly proven it time and again. He's clearly devoted to her, and asking us to believe that she's too insecure to realize it is asking too much. And didn't we lay the supposed threat from Edna Mae Wiggins to rest already in the last book? As other readers have said, this book hangs on far too thin a thread. You're not sure you're truly married? Well, your friends are already giving you heck for not throwing a "we're married" party, and they've made it plain they're none too happy that you deprived them of the chance to see you and Sam get married. So the simple answer to this dilemma is to throw a big party and have a second marriage "so that you can all share our joy with us". Nobody would ever have to know (or would ever guess) that there was another reason beyond that for this second ceremony. And you've killed two birds with one stone: made your marriage undoubtedly official and given your friends the chance to celebrate with you the way they want to. Done, over, problem solved. Instead, we're asked to wade through 9 CDs (and I don't know how many pages) as Miss Julia wrings her hands about signs from God, expresses myriad doubts about Sam, makes unwarranted assumptions about Edna Mae, ad infinitum, ad nauseum. This Miss Julia has not only not grown at all from earlier books, she's backtracked and become an unrecognizable shadow of herself. I am SO disappointed (and frustrated!). I really enjoyed the first three Miss Julia books, but these last two, and this one in particular, have been weak efforts at best.

My husband and I dearly love all of the "Miss Julia" books. We listen to them on the drive to and from work each day. People in other cars must wonder sometimes because we just crack up laughing with all of Miss Julies antics.

This book is no exception, I could just picture Lillian and Julia attempting to makeup that poor beauty contestant and the colorful results.

I sincerely hope that Mrs. Ross keeps them going. We love them all. They are a breath of fresh air in a sometimes very dreary day.