“In 2004, luxury brands collectively sold $11.7B worth of handbags and other leather accessories, and the segment is only getting stronger. While the luxury market grew by 1.2 percent each year from 2001 to 2004, leather goods sales increased by 7.5 percent each year. A large share of those sales are “It” bags: the latest hot designs that-thanks to luxury brand ad campaigns and fashion magazine articles-become the must-have of the season.” Whereas Gucci churned out the Hysteria line, Fendi rolled out with baguettes, and Dior introduced a new take on the saddle bag, “Hermes handbags are the antithesis of an “It” bag: most of the designs have been around for almost a century and are coveted not because they are in fashion but because they never go out of fashion. They don’t bear ostentatious logos; the bags themselves are sufficiently recognizable. Hermes handbags convey old money and refinement-even if those who carry them have neither (ed. Heidi Montag, anyone?).” - From Dana Thomas’s Deluxe: How Luxury Lost It’s Luster

For the past week, I’ve been immersed in Dana Thomas’s fascinating book chronicling the cult of worship that are luxury goods. From the brands’ (Hermes, Chanel, Prada, Gucci, LVMH, etc) evolution (it always begins with the best intentions, with the desire to make the finest quality goods by family owned and operated businesses) to the revolution that is our conspicuously consumptive culture (why do we feel we need that $3,000 handbag), to the marketing & advertising masterminds who made “luxury” accessible to the masses (from Chanel lipsticks to Prada nylon totes), to the dirty story of globalization (that bag was Made in Italy? Think twice about that label), capitalization, class and culture, Deluxe is a delicious story about the men & women who have transformed luxury into mass-merchandized, mass-produced, mass-consumed, commodity.

For aspirational fashionistas, the handbag is the entree into a luxury brand. Walk into Gucci, Prada, Chanel, Hermes, and the first thing you see are the accessories: scarves, small leather goods, watches, perfumes, sunglasses, and the houses’ traditional & seasonal “It” bags. Clothes tend to not sell as well (due to expense, trends, fittings, and unrealistic cost), and luxury goods companies are fully-aware of this. Only the rich can afford couture or can justify spending upwards of $4000 on a blazer, however, for those who want a small taste of the proverbial “good life,” accessories are the way in. And brands are cashing in through effective advertising (remember when magazines actually had articles) to advetorials to product placement to celebrity endorsement (or human product placement), everywhere you go, you are slammed with the idea of what luxury affords you. First rule of marketing: you’re not selling a product, you’re selling a promise, a satisfying of a consumer’s need.

Sorry for prattling on, but I find this endlessly fascinating. We are the richest country in the world, however, we’re consistently desperate to project RICHER. And I too find myself falling pray to smart marketing. I walked into a consignment shop today and fondled an Hermes Kelly. I walked out, shook my head, and kept repeating to myself: You can’t afford that bag. And more importantly: You don’t need that bag. Pay off your debt. Keep moving. Nothing to see.

But it’s nice to dream a little, isn’t it? On a related note, I’m cleaning out my closet and dumping a lot of items on Ebay. I’ll be adding items over the course of the next few days, so check it out if you’re a gal and have some $$ to spend. Chanel, Ted Baker London, Donna Karan, Barneys NY - I’m getting rid of it all.

As I lament over the expiration of my three-month investment in various dating sites (insert the usual suspects here), I wonder how hard is it for me to go on a normal date. Not with a guy who collects stuffed kittens or with a WASP advertising executive who recorded his soon-to-released solid gold hit, “SMACK DAT ASS” and proceeds to go verse for verse over carpaccio, or a recovered alcoholic who pretends to get blitzed on Perrier and cranberry. Ah, the good old days! I can’t recall the last time I’ve dated someone who can pass for normal, or at least normal by C.I.A standards.

And as another year passes and I find myself scanning registries for that perfect yet affordable shower gift for the latest friend who’s taking entrance exams for inclusion in the coveted stroller-mom set, I can’t help but want to pull my hair out as my brethren –geeks and dorks- exhibit rock star sex status in literary fiction. Yes, I know. LITERARY FICTION. But still. BUT STILL!

Let’s pause for a moment while I dust off a glazed organic donut.

Now, back to the matter at hand. All the novels I’ve read as of late are transporting me back to they heyday of Revenge of the Nerds (the original, thank you very much): a time when men with pencil protectors and women with coke-bottle glasses saved the day, won the guy/girl, and cured cancer. They have harems! They are smacking asses! Getting mad booty! So rather than pray that I turn into a Gary Shteyngart or Sam Lipsyte character for my thirty-third birthday (and it’s approaching faster than you can say AUDITION WAS A TERRIBLE MOVIE), I want to get some reality from fiction. How are all my favorite characters getting so much proverbial play? How are they achieving greatness with the opposite sex? What sage lessons can be learned?

Click here to read more.

Have I mentioned how much I adore sweets? Vanilla cupcakes with cream cheese frosting? Blueberry crumble with oat topping? A huge (HUGE!) slice of layer cake! Last Friday, at a kiddie pool party (don’t ask, but I assure you that it was great fun), I was tickled to spy a box of pastel treats - a dozen of cupcakes from Sugar, Sweet, Sunshine (read: one of the most amazing cupcakes joints in NYC). What could be better? A dear friend who calls me out on my fear of shame for loving Tori Spelling’s memoir. OWN IT! she says. Don’t switch the jacket for all of the hipsters who ride the F train.

So here’s me, owning it. I may have piles of what people call the “right books” (what does that mean, anyway?), but sometimes it’s good to enjoy something fun, delicious and wonderfully, wonderfully sweet. Rock on, Tori! I feel the mother pain.

FREE BOOK ALERT!: I’m giving away my gently used copy of sTORItelling. Want to snag a copy? Sign up for my email list (turn right) to be eligible. I’ll email the winner Saturday morning. Good luck!

photo snapped by my girl, Gillian

I might possibly get shot for posting this, but I believe this is ideal cover concept for the paperback version of my memoir, due out in May of 2009, by Harper Perennial. The cover is decidedly bold, smart, and jives with the book’s positioning (cripe, I’ve worked in publishing way too long! There goes my marketing speak). Anyway, I couldn’t be more pleased with my auspicious new home (while supremely grateful for the wonderful job that Algonquin did with the hardcover) because I know I’m in very capable hands.

To note, this is a photograph of a low-res image. The cover will be infinitely foxy (if this is the one we indeed go with).

To also note, this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t buy the hardcover!

To also note again, L.A. CityZine interviews me.

I receive many books, yet rarely are they good, or rarely are they the kinds of books I enjoy reading. Publicists tend to load me up with vampire romances, diet books, science-fiction and books with stiletto heels on the cover. Don’t get me wrong — I love a good bloodbath like anyone else, and I own several pairs of fancy shoes, however, I don’t fancy curling up to tales of carnal vampire lust or women trying to find love in the big city whilst stomping around in Blahniks, after a long day at the office. No judgment. I just know what I like and what I don’t like.

So color me surprised (are the publicists gods finally reading!) that on day two of my “stay-cation” I’m greeted with a pile of books that I’m just dying to read. Picture me tearing envelopes with my teeth. Sassy, isn’t it?

Last year I was smitten with Grégoire Bouillier’s charming, slim memoir, The Mystery Guest. This hilarious, yet endearing story chronicles all the events that lead up to a mysterious birthday party. Here’s the set-up: Bouillier’s girlfriend abandons him without saying goodbye. Years later, still confused by the abrupt loss of his great love, the phone rings (it’s her!), and she calls to invite him to the birthday party for her husband’s best friend, the artist Sophie Calle. Every year Calle throws a birthday party and invited as many people as she was years old plus a ‘mystery guest’ who stood for the year she was about to live. Bouillier’s ex is in charge of the mystery guest - hence the one and only reason for her phone call. Thus the stage is set for the unraveling. I was not only charmed by Bouillier’s deprecating, neurotic, honest prose, but I was taken with the way in which he reclaims his story after a great heartbreak.

Perhaps this is a bit of a long set-up, however, one has to understand what a wonderful memoir writer Bouillier is, and I was chuffed to receive an galley of his new memoir, Report on Myself, where the author tells the “whole crazy story of his life, from his conception in wartime Algeria to his gritty Parisian boyhood at the mercy of his working-class bohemian parents; he illuminates his life through the stories of his four love, including the relationship that nearly destroyed him, the aftermath which is chronicled in The Mystery Guest.” Pre-order my friends, for I cannot wait to read this book.

Quickly moving up the TBR pile: Tom Stoner’s The Comfort of Our Kind, David Ebershoff’s The 19th Wife, and infectious pooch-lover, Alison Pace’s City Dog. I don’t even care with this book is about; I’m sold on that fox pooch on the cover. Delish!

Dually Noted: Nam Le’s story collection, The Boat, is a must-read. I haven’t enjoyed a story collection in quite some time and I was pleased with the depth & scope of Le’s work.

You’re not like the other kids, my language-arts teacher Dr. Wasserman whispered. You’re special. She said this to an eleven-year-old who snuck into elementary school at six in the morning, carrying a bookbag bursting with dog-eared copies of paperbacks, simply to escape her house, just to read in quiet. She said this to a child who banged away at a Commodore 64 during recess in an effort to discover the myriad of ways in which one could create art out of keystrokes. To a child who took comfort in being alone, who couldn’t call a solitary person a friend. What was so special about a sixth grader who ate chicken nuggets and boiled string beans in bathroom stalls and empty classrooms? Who never had Carvel birthday parties replete with stacks of faux Cabbage Patch Kids, Menudo pins, and Glo Worm lunchboxes as gifts, and the requisite alcoholic clown. Who spent evenings fixated on Aaron Spelling soap operas, creating birthday cards out of construction paper for imaginary friends while boys beat-boxed to Slick Rick, spun records, and split slices with the girls they “sweated” (side note: I grew up in Brooklyn. Further side note: to “sweat” means to like, dig, moon over—wait, do people still say moon over?). Girls who had “tag” names like Coco, Sugar and Bunny. Saucy girls who shared clothes, smoked loosies, and spent endless hours on the phone analyzing the boys’ every movement while simultaneously badmouthing everyone who wasn’t part of their enviable circle.

Click here to read my first post for antisocial networking