It used to be that young people were let loose upon a grateful world with a modicum of social skill and the basic know-how to run a household. But such fundamental competence at the tasks of life seems to be rarer every day. How did we get to this pass? Should Mum not have done your homework? Should Dad have made Tiffany take that summer job instead of paying for her round the world trip? Perhaps. But what we really want to know is, what can we do about it? Why are so-called adults often unable to make their beds and clean up their own kitchens? They may even have jobs and apartments but why are they still relying on their doting parents to manage major details of their lives for them?In "Raised by Wolves", Christie Mellor lovingly offers a handbook full of advice and gentle verbal spankings that will send them off into the real world. She explains how to RSVP, clean a bathroom, behave in a restaurant, be a good party guest, and much, much more. It presents the things every adult needs to know in order to get through life without alienating every person they meet. This hilarious compendium includes information in a wealth of categories, including: how to poach a chicken (and what to do with it when you're done); how to make the perfect martini; 25 amazing uses for baking soda; how not to annoy your friends when you break up with your boyfriend; 10 common work situations, what you think they mean, and what they really mean; and, how to go a day without spending any money (and why you should, once in a while). Mellor's trademark arch, witty style makes even the most pointed advice palatable. If only we'd all had a book like this when we were young!
While pursuing a happy life that includes an interesting husband, two almost-always pleasant children, and a neurotic duck, Christie became a vociferous cheerleader for the "other kind of parenthood," the anti-perfection, you-deserve-a-life kind. Her first book, "The Three-Martini Playdate," was a harbinger of a new trend for today's beleaguered parents, helping them to withstand the unceasing and overbearing good advice and pressure to raise perfect, highly enriched offspring,. She continued the thread with "The Three-Martini Family Vacation." Christie also likes to draw, and does so repeatedly throughout the pages of "Raised by Wolves: Clues to the Mysteries of Adulthood," out in paperback in the spring of 2010, a book designed for the adult child whose parents did NOT read "The Three Martini Playdate." Christie's rants have been published in Britain in The Guardian, Junior Magazine, and the Sunday Express, and in Australia's Sunday Life Magazine, and she's been heard on Britain's BBC radio and American Public Radio's Marketplace, in addition to being reviewed and interviewed in Newsweek, Playboy, The New York Times, People, and other publications.
"You Look Fine, Really" is due from HarperCollins in the spring of 2010. It's for the ladies. The gals. The women. Specifically women over the age of 40. And yet, it's totally girly! Christie is very excited about this one.
