Fifth Avenue Glamour Girl
By Renée Rosen
In 1938 in New York City, a woman named Estée Lauder was producing face creams and lotions in her small apartment. Employment was scant and war fast-approaching. Her husband Joe floundered from one menial job to the next, spending most of his time caring for their son, Leonard. Estée starts selling her products in beauty parlors, giving facials and free samples to any woman with a moment to spare. As her line increases, so do her visions of fame and fortune. One day she befriends Gloria, the new shampoo girl. Estée takes the younger and less assured Gloria under her wing and fills her with a drive she never imagined. Gloria, once a pampered socialite, lost everything when her father went to Sing Sing for a Ponzi scheme, a secret she would never reveal. As Estée’s products battle rivals Revlon, Helena Rubenstein and Elizabeth Arden, she remains wholly focused on getting her cosmetics into Saks Fifth Avenue. These spirited women help each other attain success and happiness, determined to prove that women really could have it all. Based on the true life story of icon Estée Lauder, this fascinating journey expertly pulls the reader back through time.
In a New York Minute
By Kate Spencer
One morning when Franny Doyle arrives at her busy Manhattan office, she is summoned to the conference room. After four faithful years as an interior designer, she is laid off due to severe cutbacks. In shock, Franny fills a box with her meager belongings and heads to the suffocating subway. Her pretty summer dress gets caught in the doors and rips straight through the back. Surprisingly, as good Samaritans are rarely found in NY, a charming, handsome man comes to her rescue. Crying, sweating and now wrapped in his suit jacket, a flustered Franny makes her way home. Naturally, every passenger had their phone handy and this subway surprise goes viral as the strangers become the latest social media sensation. When the local news picks up the story, Franny and Hayes Montgomery III unite on a popular morning show. With much awkwardness, Franny thanks her knight in shining Gucci and expects this fiasco to end. Frustrated, jobless and questioning all her life decisions, Franny ironically continues bumping into handsome Hayes. Despite the many difficulties of being single in the city, sparks fly throughout this adorable and steamy love letter to Manhattan.
The Alienist
By Caleb Carr
In 1896, John Schuyler Moore, a New York reporter, is summoned by his old Harvard friend Theodore Roosevelt, the police commissioner. Roosevelt is trying to crack down on corruption, and crime is at the top of his agenda. He enlists Moore and eminent psychiatrist Dr. Lazlo Kreizler to solve a string of gruesome murders: young boys who cross dress and offer services at various brothels are dead. These boys are severely mutilated. It’s an obvious pattern, and quite suspicious that the police are covering it up. Kreizler, Moore and secretary Sara Howard begin to unravel the many clues to this serial killer. Kreizler is an alienist, a term coined for psychiatrists at the time, who focuses on the minds of the mentally ill with violent histories. As one of the most famous novels set in New York, this story introduces the history of forensic techniques such as fingerprinting along with Kreizler’s psychological profiling of how childhood abuse can lead to adult violence, a phenomenon more fully understood by society today than 100 years earlier. A chilling fictionalized account of social history. A series recently adapted for the screen is also on HBO Max.
WATCH TIP: The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel follows the life of Midge in 1958 NYC as a typical housewife who shockingly decides to take a turn at being a stand-up comic. The fifth and final season of this comedy releases April 14 on Prime Video.
