University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses

Fashion transgressions and crimes of style: the image of the female fashion journalist

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Fashion transgressions and crimes of style: the image of the female fashion journalist

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FASHION TRANSGRESSIONS AND CRIMES OF STYLE:
THE IMAGE OF THE FEMALE FASHION JOURNALIST

by

Sarah Christie Sotoodeh

________________________________________________________________________

A Thesis Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
MASTER OF ARTS
(BROADCAST JOURNALISM)

May 2012

Copyright 2012 Sarah Christie Sotoodeh

ii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Abstract iii

Chapter One: Method and Summary 1
Methodology 1
Literature Review 1
Summary 2

Chapter Two: Character Biographies 7

Chapter Three: Stereotypes 22
The Sob Sister 22
The Stunt Reporter 30
The Victim 36

Chapter Four: The Lonely Factor 46

Chapter Five: Cover Girls 56

Chapter Six: Love and Other Disasters 68
Ethics 68
Love and Marriage 71
Editors 72

Chapter Seven: Not Like the Movies 77

Chapter Eight: Conclusion 81

Endnotes 83

Bibliography 95

Appendix: Novel Summaries 97

iii

ABSTRACT
This work examines the image of female fashion journalists in three series of
novels by Ellen Byerrum, Sam Baker, and Eleanor Hyde. Lacey Smithsonian is the main
character in the “Crimes of Fashion” seven-novel series by Ellen Byerrum and two films,
Killer Hair and Hostile Makeover, based on two of the novels. The two films will be
compared and contrasted to the novels that inspired the films. Smithsonian will be
compared to female journalists and fashion journalists, including Annie Anderson from
the Sam Baker two-novel series and Lydia Miller, an ex-runway model turned fashion
writer in the Eleanor Hyde two-novel series.
Lacey Smithsonian hates being the fashion reporter, even though it brings her
fame and success at the paper. Even though Lacey loves to dress in clothes from the
1940s, she dislikes being forced to write about fashion instead a “serious” beat. Lacey is
a strong-willed female, but her role as a sob sister and victim is evident in the series.
Crimes of fashion occur on her beat and, as she investigates, she ends up becoming part
of the story.
Annie Anderson must fight her inner demons as she acclimates to the new
direction her career has taken as the fashion features editor for one of the top British
fashion magazines, Handbag. Her previous job was at The London Post as the chief
investigative reporter. She decided she needed a break from “serious” journalism and
thus began her job in fashion. She does not fit in with the magazine, yet she is very
successful and ends up landing coveted exclusive interviews that land her cover stories.

iv

Her investigative skills get her in trouble as she becomes involved in solving
disappearances and murders that soon threaten her life.
Lydia Miller is a former runway model who doesn’t share the same passion for
journalism as Smithsonian and Anderson. The writer doesn’t care for the craft but only
works for the fashion magazine Gazelle to pay the bills. She, too, stumbles onto murders
and must solve the cases before she becomes history.

1

CHAPTER ONE: METHOD AND SUMMARY

Methodology

Using the IJPC database, search engines, and books provided through the
University of Southern California library, I reviewed all pertinent publications regarding
the image of the female journalist and of a fashion writer.
IJPC was used to gather publications on female journalists in books and films, and
the history of newspaperwomen. In addition, research papers on female characters in
popular series were also examined.
In addition, books including Howard Good’s Girl Reporter were analyzed and
compared to the characters of the three series I focused on. I also compared the two films
inspired by the Crimes of Fashion books, featuring Lacey Smithsonian to the books
written by Ellen Byerrum.
Three series of novels were chosen, each depicting female fashion journalists
either in the newspaper or magazine industry. The journalists analyzed all involve
fashion—as a fashion writer, feature editor, or as a columnist.
Literature Review

There are several studies on the image of the female fashion journalist in books
and films, including USC graduate student Amanda Rossie’s paper, Beauty, Brains, and
Bylines: Comparing the Female Journalist in the fiction of Sheryl Woods and Sarah
Shankman. In addition, Danielle Ethlyne Nieman’s paper The Lovesick Journalist: The
Image of the Female Journalist in Danielle Steele’s Novels studies a journalist, Fiona

2

Monaghan in the novel Second Chances, and the image she portrays as a fashion
magazine editor.
The book Girl Reporter by Howard Good provided historical context of what the
image of the female journalist has been since the turn of the century. His analysis on
newspaperwoman in films form the early 1930s and 1940s define what types of
stereotypes exist for the female journalist.
The films examined by Good depict female journalists as independent,
headstrong, stylish women that are also weak, needy women who need strong men in her
life. A closer look at the history of women in newspapers was examined through Donna
Born’s research, The Image of the Woman Journalist in America Popular Fiction 1890 to
the Present.
Summary

To date, Ellen Byerrum has written seven novels in the “Crimes of Fashion”
series: Killer Hair, Designer Knockoff, Hostile Makeover, Raiders of the Lost Corset,
Grave Apparel, Armed and Glamorous, and Shot Through Velvet. Two movies have
been made based on the first and third books: Killer Hair and Hostile Makeover.
The main characters in the novels are: Lacey Smithsonian, fashion columnist;
Tony Trujillo, a police reporter; Douglas MacArthur “Mac” Jones, the editor of The Eye
Street Observer; Felicity Pickles, food editor; Todd Hansen, news photographer; Peter
Johnson, political reporter; Damon Newhouse, blogger for Deadfed.com; Harlan
Wiedemeyer, death and dismemberment reporter, and Cassandra Wentworth, an editorial
writer.

3

In Killer Hair, Smithsonian is introduced as the fashion columnist for The Eye
Street Observer in Washington, D.C. She yearns to be taken seriously and dreams of
having her name on the front page. Although she dislikes being on the fashion beat,
Lacey loves to wear vintage clothes and fashions from the 1940s. Her idols are movie
sirens Lauren Bacall, Rita Hayworth and Rosalind Russell. Her column, “Crimes of
Fashion,” is extremely popular. Smithsonian’s friend, hairstylist Stella LeBlanc, talks
Smithsonian into looking into the murder of hairstylist Angie Woods. LeBlanc enlists
her help after the police call Woods’ death a suicide and close the case. Smithsonian uses
fashion clues to investigate the story and must solve the crime before she becomes the
next victim.
In Designer Knockoff, Smithsonian once again stumbles onto a crime involving
fashion. This time, the plot circles around the House of Bentley fashion, which is back in
the news with its namesake fashion museum opening its doors. Smithsonian must solve
the murder of a Bentley intern, which is somehow connected to the disappearance of a
woman, Gloria Adams, sixty years ago. Adams was a friend of Lacey’s Great Aunt Mimi
and had a relationship with Bentley Senior.
In Hostile Makeover, model Amanda Manville is murdered. Manville was a
contestant on an extreme makeover reality show. Manville’s makeover made her
beautiful but also turned her into a monster. Her new fashion line is coming out and
Smithsonian was set to cover the first show but instead witnesses her murder.
Smithsonian uses her journalistic skills to solve the murder of the supermodel and find
out who blackmailed and killed Manville.

4

In Raiders of the Lost Corset, Smithsonian takes her sleuthing skills to France,
where she tries to solve the poisoning of a friend, corset designer Magda Rousseau, and
find her missing jewels. Smithsonian goes with Brooke Barton, her best friend, and is
being followed by a mysterious ex-KGB spy and a British jewelry retriever. The clues
left by Rousseau and her grandfather take Smithsonian from France to New Orleans,
Louisiana.
In the fifth novel, called Grave Apparel, Smithsonian has to solve an attack on a
co-worker, editorial writer Cassandra Wentworth. The trouble starts when Wentworth
writes a scathing condemnation about Christmas sweaters and Smithsonian is blamed for
the mean-spirited attack on Christmas sweaters and holiday cheer. Smithsonian must
find the attacker and is assigned the job of clearing the name of Felicity Pickles and
Harlan Wiedemeyer. The only witness to the assault is a little homeless girl who runs off
whenever Smithsonian gets too close.
In the sixth book, Armed and Glamorous, Smithsonian finds herself at the
forefront of another murder, this time at her first private investigation course.
Smithsonian wants to take the class in order to get out of the fashion beat. The victim is
heiress Cecily Ashton, who was profiled by Smithsonian days before her murder. Her
missing Louis Vuitton jewelry case, once owned by actress Rita Hayworth, is the key to
finding out who killed the heiress.
In the seventh book, Shot Through Velvet, Smithsonian must solve the murder of
Rod Gibbs, part owner of a recently shut down velvet factory. Smithsonian finds Gibbs

5

completely blue and strung up by blue velvet. She tries to find out who the killer is
before she becomes the next target.
In the Lifetime movies Killer Hair and Hostile Makeover, Maggie Lawson plays
Lacey Smithsonian, James McDaniel plays Mac, Mark Consuelos plays Tony Trujillo,
and Jocelyne Loewen plays Felicity Pickles.
Sam Baker’s novel series revolves around former investigative journalist turned
fashion magazine writer Annie Anderson. The series includes two books, Fashion Victim
and Deadly Beautiful. Besides Anderson, the main characters include Rebecca Brooks,
the editor-in-chief at Handbag magazine; Lou McCartney, fashion editor for The Post;
Ken Greenhouse, news editor at The Post.
In Fashion Victim, Anderson becomes the newest fashion features editor for
Handbag magazine after she quits her job as the chief investigative reporter for The Post.
While working on a piece on New York Fashion Week, Anderson witnesses the murder
of Mark Mailer, whom she had been shadowing for a cover story. The murder leads
Anderson on a chase that takes her across the globe to Rome with the help of a troubled
supermodel, Patty Lang, who happens to be the wife of the murdered fashion designer.
As she closes in on the murderer, Anderson becomes a target and must solve the murder
before it’s too late.
In Deadly Beautiful, Anderson travels to Tokyo, Japan, in search of a missing
model, Scarlett Ulrich. Ulrich is the half-sister of Anderson’s best friend, Lou
McCartney, who asked Anderson to find out what happened to her younger sibling who

6

was in the country working. Anderson must figure out what happened to the missing
model before she, too, vanishes.
In Eleanor Hyde’s novel In Murder We Trust, the main character, Lydia Miller,
becomes a suspect after her millionaire friend, Adam Auerbach, is found dead in his
swimming pool. Miller begins to investigate the murder and, in the process, puts herself
in harm’s way. While attempting to solve the murder, Miller must also figure out if the
rash of murders by a serial killer in the Hamptons is related to the drowning before she
becomes a victim, too.
In the second novel of the series, Animal Instincts, Miller is back in action
investigating a suspicious connection between an animal shelter and a so-called miracle
anti-aging lotion called Anima that has the fashion world agog. Miller tries to save the
animals at the shelter from deadly consequences before she becomes part of the mystery.
Besides Miller, the main characters include Milke Forte, the editor-in-chief of
Gazelle magazine; Gillian Smith-Markham, Miller’s assistant; Regina Fellows, beauty
editor, and Davis Whalen, fashion photographer.

7

CHAPTER TWO: CHARACTER BIOGRAPHIES

Lacey Smithsonian: Fashion Reporter

You know we don’t cover real fashion here. How come you never send me to New York?
Or Paris for Fashion Week? I’ve never even been to Paris.
1

—Lacey Smithsonian

Lacey Blaine Smithsonian, 33, was born in Denver, Colorado, but works as a
fashion reporter in Washington, D.C. for The Eye Street Observer (a newspaper she has
worked at for three years). “Lacey had a face that a man had once told her belonged on
the cover of a pulp-fiction magazine. Pretty, but a little exaggerated, a little extreme for
comfort. There were even men who had called her beautiful.”
2
Smithsonian has
shoulder-length light brown hair with blonde highlights, evoking “a hint of Lauren
Bacall”
3
and blue-green eyes. “She was five-foot-five with a curvy build that she fought
to keep on the slim side.”
4

She worked at smaller newspapers in Colorado. Her last job before she moved to
D.C. was the police beat at The Sagebrush Daily Press newspaper. Her first job in
Washington was working as a junior reporter for the city beat at The Eye Street Observer.
Lacey is the older sister of Cherise, 32, a former high school cheerleader. The
sisters are alumni of Geronimo High School. Lacey always felt different from her family.
Her mother, Rose, does not understand Lacey’s passion for 1940s-style clothes. The
Smithsonians were reared as Catholics.
5

Before she moved to Washington, Lacey was used to feeling strange, an outsider,
an observer. When she was little, she had always considered herself a swan, and
her family of ducks never knew what to make of her. Her mother often said she
had no idea where Lacey came from. Rose Smithsonian suggested that it was

8

likely a caravan of gypsies had dropped in one night, stolen the real baby
Smithsonian, and left Lacey as a little joke. The real baby Smithsonian would be
perky and have cheerleading genes and wear what Mother wanted.
The real baby Smithsonian would have grown up and found a man by now. She’d
be tied down to a house, kids, and meatloaf once a week.
Lacey let her eyes sail down the verdant Potomac. My pheromones may be
jammed, she thought, but at least I’m a swan on my own river.
6

Smithsonian loves to wear vintage clothes, especially the styles from the 1940s. Mimi’s
trunk has patterns, fabric and magazine cutouts of dress ideas from the same style. Her
most prized possession is her late Great-Aunt Mimi’s trunk. Mimi never finished sewing
dozens of dresses but kept all the unfinished pieces in the trunk, which she left to
Smithsonian. Smithsonian chooses an unfinished pattern and has her seamstress, Alma
Lopez, complete the piece exactly like the photo Mimi left pinned onto the pattern. She
drives a silver and burgundy Nissan 280ZX and lists gin and tonic as a source of
inspiration.
7
She has a two-bedroom apartment that overlooks the Potomac River.
Smithsonian has a complicated relationship with Victor Donovan, 38, who works
at a security consultation firm in D.C. Smithsonian and Donovan have known each other
for six years but were never romantically involved in Sagebrush. Donovan was the chief
of police there and met Smithsonian as she worked the police beat. They never became a
couple because Donovan was only separated, not divorced, from his wife, Montana
Donovan.
The editor of The Eye chose Smithsonian for the fashion beat based on her style.
“She looked like she had stepped out of a Cary Grant movie. Smithsonian seemed
perfect for the job, at least to him. Most reporters at The Eye looked like they dressed out
of a rummage sale at the congressional cloakroom.”
8

9

Felicity Pickles: Food Editor
Felicity Pickles is a food editor and also a part-time copy editor for The Eye Street
Observer. She dreams of becoming the fashion reporter for the newspaper and resents
Smithsonian for taking the fashion beat. What makes Pickles dislike her more is that
Smithsonian hates being on the fashion beat.
Pickles has “aqua eyes and pink cheeks, bright against her clear pale skin and
long dark auburn hair, making Felicity appear soft and approachable.”
9

She loves baking and creating recipes for her readers and brings different desserts
to the newsroom daily. Pickles enjoys making the treats just as much as she enjoys
hearing people thank her for them. “Restocking the cookie plate, Felicity waited
expectantly for some word of acknowledgement from Cassandra. It was part of the deal.
The unspoken agreement. Felicity offered fattening goodies, reporters repaid her with
fawning flattery.”
10

To Smithsonian, Pickles does this to make everyone overweight and happy. “To
Lacey, there was still the hint of a chubby malevolent doll about Felicity, a doll who
might whip out a sharp knife and slice more than your cake.”
11

Lacey was grateful that the evil food editor, Felicity Pickles, wasn’t around.
Instead, Felicity had left a dangerous batch of brownies at her desk, which was
just across the aisle from Lacey’s. The food editor was forever dieting and
brought something fattening to the office every day. Today, the chocolate-iced fat
bombs bore an elaborate handwritten note inviting everyone to Eat Me.
12

However, once Smithsonian sees that Pickles has a crush on Harlan Wiedemeyer, who
feels the same for her, the relationship between the two women improves. No longer

10

enemies, Smithsonian and Pickles are mutually kind and Smithsonian even clears
Pickles’ name as a person of interest in a case.
Tony Trujillo: Police Reporter

Tony Trujillo, the senior police reporter, hails from Santa Fe, New Mexico, and is
very attractive. “Tony’s thick black hair, his smooth olive skin, his self-professed writing
prowess, and his status as the cops writer, which entitled him to abuse the language in
new and colorful ways, attracted women in droves.”
13

Trujillo has “cocoa-brown almond eyes”
14
and always wears leather boots, made
from armadillo or lizard, portraying his “western nonchalance.”
15

Although Smithsonian finds him arrogant, she does think he is attractive. “He
wore his blue jeans and tight T-shirts so well that coming or going, Lacey had to admit,
he was a feast for the eye.”
16
Smithsonian is jealous of him because even though they
were hired the same week, she was put on the city beat as a junior reporter while he was
put on the police beat.
17

A bona-fide ladies man, he is known as “Tony Terrific” by the women who don’t
know him romantically. “Tony was handsome and he knew it, setting female newsroom
hearts to pitter-patter, but Lacey was immune to his charms.”
18
For the women who
romantically know him in The Eye’s newsroom, his nickname becomes “Tony Terrible”
after their trysts.
19

Douglas MacArthur “Mac” Jones: Editor

Mac is “a squat tyrant with a bullet head and bristling mustache.” He is married to
Kim MacArthur, a petite Asian women, whom he loves dearly. He has a “smooth

11

caramel-hued face” and “bushy black eyebrows drawn together like caterpillars
huddling.”
20

Smithsonian describes him as “her foe, her friend, and sometimes her nemesis. In
other words, her editor.”
21
Mac is grouchy but deep down, he has a softer side.
Peter Johnson: Capitol Hill Reporter

A Dweeb Prima Donna.
22

–Lacey Smithsonian

Peter Johnson is “thirty-nine, unmarried, asexual, and possibly de-hormoned. He
had a face like a pinched nerve, his lips drawn into a tight, thin line.”
23
He is The Eye’s
“lead writer on the latest congressional scandal series.”
24

He wears “owlish glasses up his nose” and enjoys glaring at Lacey.
25
He dislikes
Smithsonian immensely and believes he is the smartest person at the paper. “Johnson was
a prima donna Hill reporter who had become her sworn enemy after she stumbled onto
his territory during that little scandal in the spring.”
26
He has a “concave chest,” “rotund
belly,” and “thinning brown hair.”
27

Harlan Wiedemeyer: Death and Dismemberment Reporter

Harlan Wiedemeyer is the resident death and dismemberment reporter who
“relished telling the world every day how some ‘poor bastard’ died in a freak accident or
grotesque workplace disaster. Untold poor bastards drowned in vats of chocolate, were
ground up in the gars of heavy machinery, turned into sausage.”
28

He is a “little man,” with “thinning brown hair stuck to his head.” His round belly
“gave evidence of his love of doughnuts.”
29

12

Bad things seem to happen around him but in his mind, he is really lucky to
escape situations alive. His fellow co-workers steer clear of him, afraid his bad luck rub
off on them. Wiedemeyer is “a Jonah, a jinx, a bringer of bad luck.”
30

Cassandra Wentworth: Editorial Reporter

Cassandra Wentworth writes for the editorial section of the newspaper. She has a
“straight middle-part haircut,” “horn-rimmed glasses,” and wears her signature
“shapeless burlap-brown sack of a dress” to work to hide her skinny frame.
31

She judges everyone and everything around her. She dislikes Smithsonian
because she thinks fashion is frivolous and not an important issue. “Ms. Wentworth lived
her life as an eternal penitent, apologizing for crimes she did not commit. She wept for
whales and thought globally and walked for the cure, and she was always on the lookout
to stamp out the politically incorrect thought, in herself and in others.”
32
She hates
Christmas and holidays because all she can think about is people who don’t have food in
Africa. She doesn’t want people to be happy when others are suffering, and is “a dark
specter of doom.”
33

She is also known as an “eco-bitch.”
34
“No matter how cold it was, unless there
was a foot of ice and snow on the ground, Cassandra rode her bike to the office. She
saved fuel. She saved the planet. She was ‘carbon neutral.’ She was a shining example
for the rest of the slobs who worked at The Eye. No rest for the ecologically correct. But
first there was a fashion reporter to torment.”
35

13

Todd Hansen: News Photographer

Todd “long-lensed” Hansen is the news photographer for the paper. “Long, lanky
Hansen was striding into view with a couple of Nikons hanging around his neck and a
bag of film. His scruffy blond hair was in need of a cut. He was wearing his usual blue
jeans and oxford-cloth shirt, and some sort of grubby athletic shoes.”
36

LaToya Crawford: Metro Reporter

LaToya Crawford is the “pretty African-American Metro section reporter”
37
She
is friendly toward Lacey and also very nosy.
Meg Chong: General News Reporter

Meg Chong is “a general news reporter”
38
and likes to wear revealing outfits,
especially when around the paper’s sports reporters. “Meg was tiny and stylish and wore
her long black hair in a high ponytail decorated with sparkling jewelry. Her silver
spaghetti strap dress left nothing to the imagination and the back dipped well below her
waist. Lacey felt chilly just looking at her.”
39

Kelly Kavanaugh: Junior Reporter

Kelly Kavanaugh is the newest member of The Eye staff and works as a junior
reporter for the police beat. She has a “freckled face”
40
and “looked like a kid on her way
to study hall. Her straight brown hair hung to her shoulders and her straight bangs
reached her eyebrows. Kavanaugh wore khaki slacks, a lightweight green windbreaker
zipped up to her neck, and a pair of cross trainers.”
41

14

Claudia Darnell: Publisher

Claudia Darnell is the publisher of the newspaper. She is originally from Black
Martin, Virginia, and was part of a major scandal in Washington, D.C. She had a
relationship with a married congressman and was shunned by the D.C. elite. She fought
back and as revenge bought a newspaper. “Claudia was a woman of a certain age, fifty-
something, but she had a killer figure and a proven magnetism for male attention.”
42

Damon Newhouse: Blogger

Damon Newhouse is the creator and blogger of the Conspiracy Clearinghouse
website, which is also called DeadFed. He “fancied himself a journalist of the people, a
cyber-hotshot who embraced every crackpot theory the mainstream media wouldn’t
touch.”
43

He idolizes Smithsonian and her knack for solving crimes. Smithsonian, on the
other hand, thinks he is a nuisance, crazy, and not even a real journalist. Newhouse is
also trying to get Smithsonian to get him a job as a journalist for The Eye. He thinks
aliens and trolls are real and the government is hiding the information from the people.
He likes to follow Smithsonian and tries to take her stories and add alien theories.
Newhouse is also the boyfriend of Smithsonian’s best friend, Brooke Barton, a lawyer
who also believes in conspiracies.
Annie Anderson: Fashion Writer

It’s more difficult to bug people when they’re moving.
44

-Annie Anderson

15

Annie Anderson, 28, was born in England and currently resides in London. She
worked at The London Post as the chief investigative reporter until she quit and began
working as the fashion features editor for Handbag magazine.
The British journalist has “bright red lips,” short dark hair, is “shortish” and “not
bad looking but for the scowl and a mouth she learned the hard way to keep in check.”
Annie has a background in investigative journalism and decided to enter the journalism
field after she was raped by her then-boyfriend, Tony Panton, when she was a teenager.
“Tall, fashionable, and popular, Tony Panton had seemed the answer to any teenage girl’s
prayers and her passport to a life of cool people and cooler parties. A life Annie had only
ever eyed longingly from the sidelines. How wrong could she be?”
45

Anderson had a normal upbringing and did well in school. She met Panton and
couldn’t believe someone cool like him would be attracted to someone like her.
In her teens Annie had gone out with Tony Panton for five months. This was how
long it took him to take her virginity, reveal the thug behind the smile, call her
hysterical, sleep with one of her friends, send her roses, and rape her. She’d been
seventeen and three days, the evening it happened.
She failed her A levels; he moved on to another girlfriend.
All of it left Annie’s parents wondering why their daughter wouldn’t return his
calls, answer his letters, or let him through the door.
The general consensus was that she treated Tony Panton rather badly.
Annie let everyone think what they wanted to think, because explaining what
really happened would have been far worse. Anyway, she had applied for, and
got, a place on a journalism course. It turned out to be the best thing that ever
happened to her.
So much easier to look at life from the outside.
46

Anderson left her investigative reporting position because she blamed herself for the
murder of Irina Krodt, a child prostitute who was killed while the reporter was
investigating a story. The death haunted her constantly and, no matter what, she couldn’t

16

shake the image of Irina lying dead and what her story had caused. Most importantly, she
was consumed by guilt. “The face of Irina Krodt, barely sixteen but looking far younger,
devastatingly pretty with sallow skin and dark hair. It was Irina’s eyes that haunted
Annie, dark and dead, staring flatly out of the page, making everyone who looked into
them culpable.”
47
While her co-workers, like Greenhouse, praise her investigation on the
child prostitution ring in England, all Anderson can think about is that she wasn’t able to
save Irina. “‘Good story, that,’ he said. ‘And, for the record, Anderson, what happened
wasn’t your fault. Whatever you think.’ Annie wished she could believe that.”
48

She wanted to run away from the serious stories and the only way to do that was
to start working for Handbag, a top British fashion magazine. Anderson uses the fashion
position as a break from “serious” reporting and a way to escape reality. “It was thanks
to Ken that Annie got an undercover job on Handbag, part of an investigation into Mafia
connections in the fashion industry. The trouble was nobody expected Annie to like
working in magazines so much she’d decide to stay.”
49
No one at the paper or Handbag
except Ken Greenhouse, the news editor for The Post and Lou McCartney, her best
friend, knows that she is only at the magazine temporarily.
Her boss, news editor Ken Greenhouse, leaned against a filing cabinet,
shirtsleeves rolled up, tie half undone, his heavy eyes troubled. “Sure you want to
go through with this Handbag thing?”
As she checked that her mobile was working, Annie nodded. “Yes,” she said,
glancing up. “You know why.”
The Yorkshireman shrugged. “You couldn’t have saved Irina, you know.”
“Then I shouldn’t have started,” said Annie, pushing away the memory of a
teenage girl, large eyes dark and haunted, devoid of trust. “saving her was the
whole point, surely?” They were talking about Annie’s last story, and not for the
first time.
Ken allowed himself a small sigh, deciding not to go there. Instead he summoned
a half smile. “Get a move on, love,” he said.
50

17

She secretly loved the fashion world and all that it represented but still felt like an
outsider. Her investigative co-workers laughed at her for “changing careers” and her new
peers in the fashion world looked down at her for the way she looked. She didn’t belong
to either world and Annie felt as if she were stuck alone. She realized that working in the
fashion industry meant she could not only not escape her memories but also live out her
secret dream to work in the fashion industry.
Like Smithsonian’s family, Anderson’s family does not understand her. When
she called her mother to tell her about her career change, her mom harshly judges her—
unable to see past her stereotypes.
Annie forced a smile onto her face in the hope it would carry through to her voice.
“Mum,” she said patiently. “This is a great opportunity. And you know I always
wanted to work on a glossy. Handbag is really well respected and I’ll get to
travel all over the world. New York, Paris, Milan…Just think, I’ll see all those
amazing cities and it won’t cost me a penny. Anyway, you’re always saying how
much you worry about me being lonely since Nick left, now you won’t have to.
Maybe I’ll find a good-looking Italian…”
It wasn’t hard to interpret the silence swirling down the telephone line. Annie had
played the wrong card and she knew it. She could almost see her mother’s face,
tight-lipped with disapproval as she sat at the kitchen table, six o’clock news
playing in the background, one eye on Dad’s tea bubbling on the cooker, the other
focused inward on the mess her younger daughter was making of her life.
51

To add to Anderson’s fragility, her mother attacks the fashion industry and all that it
represents. For Anderson, the fashion world is a way out, her savior from the darkness of
her life. To her mother, it represents fluff and isn’t something she can support or be
proud of:
“Why can’t you just stay put? You’ve hardly been there for five minutes and now
you’re chucking it all in to work on one of those magazines that make women
anorexic.”
The horror with which her mother said this made Annie wince.

18

“And what about the money?” Her mother continued, barely pausing for breath.
“You always said magazines paid less than newspapers.”
“They’re paying me the same. Not a penny difference.” It was Annie’s first
truthful comment since her mother called. Staring at the scruffy woman who
stared back from the rain-spattered office window, Annie scowled; her short dark
curls looked like she’d gotten out of bed and not in a good way.
“So why are you leaving, if they’re not even paying you more?”
Too late Annie realized that a bigger salary might have given her mother a reason
for accepting the change. Damn it, why hadn’t that occurred to her ten seconds
earlier? Holding the phone away from her ear, Annie began to count slowly:
one…two…three…four…five…six
“Annie,” came the voice. “Are you there?”
52

Ken Greenhouse: The Post News Editor

Ken Greenhouse is The London Post news editor. Hailing from Yorkshire,
England, Greenhouse acts more like Anderson’s friend than former boss.
Lou McCartney: The Post Fashion Writer

Lou McCartney is The Post’s resident fashion reporter and Anderson’s best
friend. The estranged daughter of billionaire Rufus Ulrich, she is portrayed as an
independent and confident woman in Fashion Victim. “Lou, as ever, was immaculately
dressed, her Prada coat perfectly offsetting thrift shop boots. Anyone else would have
looked like a bag lady but Lou just looked, well, like Lou…It was Lou who had helped
Annie get in with Handbag magazine.”
53

Her vulnerability is learned in Deadly Beautiful, as her half-sister Scarlett is
reported missing and she must talk about her cold father and their estranged relationship
to Anderson. She realizes that she isn’t the only one with secrets as McCartney tells her
about her successful father. McCartney tends to have relationships with married men and
cannot stop herself from falling in love with the unattainable. Her desperate need for
love and men is what drives McCartney to pursue them. However, she realizes she

19

doesn’t have to look for love with married men but has to love herself and realize her
self-worth before committing to someone intimately.
Rebecca Brooks: Handbag magazine editor

Rebecca Brooks, the editor-in-chief of Handbag magazine, is also from England.
She has “tastefully highlighted, shoulder-length hair.”
54

Brooks spent ten years in London on magazines, and steadily working her way
up. She moved to the U.S. and became the editor-in-chief of Trend Magazine where she
“acquired networking skills and a contacts book that were second to none.”
55
She moved
back to London after she was offered the opportunity to launch Handbag magazine. “No
one in the magazine business equaled Rebecca for clout and sheer chutzpah except U.S.
Vogue’s Anna Wintour. Office rumor had it that Wintour was the only person Rebecca
once admitted drunkenly she might never surpass.”
56

Lydia Miller: Fashion Writer

Maybe I need a lawyer.
57

—Lydia Miller

Lydia Miller, 34, a former runway model, is tall and skinny with dark blonde hair.
“Her winged eyebrows gave her a snotty look that had her on the runways (after she’d
learned to tousle her hair to cover up stick-out ears) until wholesome became the rage.”
58

After her modeling career finished, she got a job at Gazelle, a fashion magazine in New
York City. Her column, “Chic to Chic,” about fashion trends, took off because “style
was all she knew and she stuck with it.”
59

A widow after her husband Mark, succumbed to AIDS, Miller felt like she was
treated differently because of her husband’s disease. “They were all very nice to her at

20

Gazelle. Too nice. A lot of whispering went on behind her back as soon as Mark had
gone to the hospital. For supposedly sophisticated people, they acted like a bunch of
hicks.”
60

She used to live in an “enormous white-brick-walled loft”
61
in Tribeca with her
husband but had to sell it to pay his hospital bills. Now Miller lives in a “leprous-walled
shotgun apartment with faulty wiring and holes in the floor.”
62
However, her apartment
was still in the fashionable area of the Upper East Side. “It was cheap and the fireplace
and shutters lent a certain charm. Rent for an apartment on the West Side from below
New York University to above Columbia University had been out of the question—far
too expensive.”
63

After Mark’s death, Miller was left with the enormous hospital bills from St.
Vincent’s. Her friend Auerbach loves her, but not in a sexual way. He offered to pay for
Mark’s care at a hospital in Paris but they refused. A millionaire friend who lives in
Southhampton, he ultimately drowns in his pool and is found by Miller.
She has one younger sister, Charlotte or “Chots,” who with her three children
lives with their mother in her hometown of Brigadoon, Ohio.
Miller has been afraid of water ever since she almost drowned at a Girl Scout
camp as a child.
64
Yet she instinctively jumped into the pool to unsuccessfully try to
save Auerbach. Miller takes in his dog, Colombo, as a way to remember him and also do
what Auerbach would have wanted, to have Colombo loved and taken care of.
Auerbach chose Miller as one of the chief beneficiaries of his estate, which made
Miller a multi-millionaire. The money doesn’t change Miller and she continues working

21

and living in the same apartment complex, although she spends more time in the house
Auerbach left her in Southhampton.
Milke Forte: Editor-in-chief of Gazelle magazine

Milke Forte is the current editor-in-chief of Gazelle magazine and Miller’s boss.
A “wiry, sharp-featured woman rumored to be in her early seventies,” didn’t look it.
“Not that she looked younger. She just looked ageless.”
65
She looks good for her age,
mostly because she has “good bones.”
66
Forte also bears “a slight resemblance to Coco
Chanel, which she played to the hilt, wearing little black numbers with silk flowers, ropes
of pearls, and gold chains.”
67

Gillian Smith-Markham, Assistant

Gillian Smith-Markham, 24, is Miller’s assistant at Gazelle. She is from England
and only recently moved to New York. She has a “pale redhead’s complexion.”
68

Regina Fellows, Beauty Editor

Regina Fellows is the beauty editor for Gazelle and Miller’s least favorite co-
worker. Fellows has dark hair and wears high-end designer clothes, something Miller
cannot believe because she herself cannot afford that kind of clothing, even as a former
model.
Davis Whalen, Fashion Photographer

Davis Whalen is the fashion photographer for Gazelle. He replaced Miller’s late
husband, who previously held that position.

22

CHAPTER THREE: STEREOTYPES

The Sob Sister

Curiosity is a real bad habit of reporters.
69

—Lacey Smithsonian

In the early 20
th
century, female journalists were hired to write stories about
society and human interest, focusing on soft news, including fashion, beauty and cooking.
“Hollywood’s female reporters, as one newspaperman put it, ‘did more glamorous work
than most of those who toiled on real papers. Too often, young female reporters, even on
big city papers have been confined to covering ‘social’ news, ‘women’s page’ features
and the like.’”
70

In the 1930s, the character Torchy Blane, a girl reporter, appeared on film. Blane,
played by actress Glenda Farrell, was “exceptionally attractive, exceptionally energetic,
exceptionally tough.”
71
As one of the earlier sob sisters on film, Blane did her work as
well as any newspaperman, but became a weak-kneed female when her boyfriend, police
Lt. Steve McBride came into the picture. “Her frenetic energy, rapid-fire repartee, and
man-tailored suits may have suggested that she was the equal of any man, but the image
was misleading.”
72

The phrase sob sister came to describe female reporters who can match a man in
the professional front, but show her weak, “feminine” side when a man does her wrong.
“Most women reporters resented this label because it reinforced the stereotype of women
as big-hearted but soft-minded, emotionally generous but intellectually sloppy.”
73

23

When Mac puts Smithsonian on the “girly” fashion beat, he relegates her to a
stereotypical female role. She wants to be taken seriously, and for her, that cannot
happen unless she is taken off the fashion beat. Her ideal job would be the crime or
police beat—serious journalism. The frivolous fashion beat is a joke to her, yet she still
conforms and writes columns. She says she can’t write about fashion in D.C., a city
where there is no fashion. Smithsonian’s own passion for fashion and the amount of care
she puts into choosing her outfits does not help her like her beat.
Smithsonian’s co-workers see her as a fashion writer and only that, with no other
newspaper skills. Her co-workers and people she meets don’t take her seriously and
sometimes laugh when they hear what kind of journalist she is. Smithsonian dislikes her
job because other people think she is unintelligent and she yearns for a chance to be
viewed as an equal. When she introduces herself as the fashion reporter to strangers or
sources, they don’t see her as a journalist. Although she went to journalism school and
formerly worked as a crime reporter in Colorado, all people see is someone who only
knows fashion. “The sob sister always has to prove herself. She has to persuade the
males around her that she is worthy of their respect. She often screws up before winning
her stripes, but, by and large, she is an independent, hardworking reporter who never lets
her newspaper down.”
74

Smithsonian realizes the advantage she has when people mistakenly judge her as
dumb when she is following a story. “‘I’m a fashion reporter.’ Smithsonian assumed it
was enough of an explanation. ‘Oh.’ The three said in unison, achieving a ragged three-
part harmony.”

24

Once they think she lacks intelligence, the sources usually speak more loosely and say
things they might regret if they thought they were speaking to a police reporter.
The character of Fiona Monaghan, in the Daniel Steel novel Second Chance is
also involved in fashion journalism. However, unlike Monaghan, Smithsonian despises
being on the fashion beat, while Monaghan is passionate about it, eventually climbing up
the ladder and becoming the editor of a top fashion magazine.
75

Like Monaghan, Anderson loves the fashion beat, although she doesn’t want to
admit it. As someone who was once considered a serious reporter, Anderson’s passion
for the fashion beat surprises her. She also learned that the fashion journalism world is
extremely competitive.
In the Sheryl Woods novels, the main character, Amanda Roberts, is a 28-year-
old career-minded woman. She moved to a small Southern town from New York City,
where she was a police reporter. Roberts finds that in the South, she is stuck on the
female beats—cooking, clothes and anything else that would be considered feminine.
After she finds out her husband is having an affair, Roberts begins to actively try to
change her life for the better. She gets a divorce and a new job as a crime reporter. She
takes control of her life, while Smithsonian remains unhappy with her beat. However,
like Roberts, Smithsonian dislikes how her beat defines her and stereotypes her as
something other than a “real” journalist.
Annie Anderson goes against the stereotype and has a successful investigative
reporting career. Anderson’s Post co-workers respected her and admired her work when
she was the chief investigative reporter. It didn’t matter that she kept to herself and

25

worked alone on the majority of the stories because she proved herself out in the field.
“From the beginning, women reporters were independent, hard-boiled dames ready and
willing to do anything their male counterparts would do to get the story. The sob sister
always had to prove herself.”
76

However, when co-workers got wind of her decision to leave her position and
begin working at a fashion magazine, they couldn’t understand why. ‘“Going into
fashion?” Green said. “I ask you. The woman’s meant to be an award-winning
journalist. What’s she going to investigate there? Skirt lengths?’”
77

When Ugly Betty’s Betty Suarez found out she got the assistant position at Mode
magazine, she realized she could use it as a way to get into the magazine industry. She
graduated college with a degree in journalism, putting her on equal footing with other
journalists. Although she was educated and ready to be a serious journalist, she accepts
the position as an assistant at a fashion magazine, and as a sob sister. Smithsonian likes
fashion but hates her beat and doesn’t see it as a launching pad. Unlike Suarez, she feels
stalled in the fashion world and doesn’t feel as if she has reached her potential.
Anderson knows her former co-workers think she is destroying her journalistic
career, but she doesn’t care what they think. She doesn’t want to be seen as a sob sister
and continues to work hard investigating stories, although in the fashion industry.
Although her rape has damaged her self-confidence and trust in men, it hasn’t affected
her determination to be the best journalist she can be. “Occasionally, the sob sister shows
signs of feminine frailty—most female reporters eventually need rescuing by the most

26

available male. But more often than not, she outwits, outfoxes, and out reports every male
reporter in sight.”
78

Anderson had to prove to others she wasn’t a sob sister, just as Smithsonian and
Roberts. After Anderson began working as a fashion features editor, she worked hard at
showing she could still produce meaningful journalism, even when cast as weak-minded
by her former co-workers. She used her merit and journalistic talent while investigating
the murder of fashion designer Mailer. “Widely tipped as fashion’s next big thing, Mark
Mailer was the toast of Manhattan. He was also Annie’s maiden assignment for
Handbag and the magazine’s first foray into semi-serious journalism.”
79

Like Smithsonian, the character Andrea Sachs in the film The Devil Wears Prada
aspires to do “serious journalism,” even though she is stuck working in the fashion world.
Sachs has a similar educational background as Suarez and Anderson, but is only offered a
position as the editor in chief’s assistant. “Writing for The New Yorker was the only thing
Andrea had ever wanted. She was a serious journalist, and the last thing she could ever
care about was fashion.”
80
She too wanted to prove that she could be a good journalist,
but isn’t given the chance to show her skills because of her slovenly appearance and her
lack of real world experience.
Anderson’s love interest, Chris Mahoney, first meets her the day after the murder.
Mahoney works in the fashion industry and in the past, worked in fashion PR. When she
talks about the murder, she begins to tear up, even surprising herself. She rushes to the
bathroom to collect herself. “This was not Annie the journalist, or even Annie the
fashion editor, it was just Annie, stripped of armor and staring at her face in the age-

27

damaged mirror. She felt naked.”
81
Although Anderson tries hard to stay strong, she is
cast as a sob sister. Later, breaks down again in front of Mahoney, proving the stereotype
that even successful female reporters need the help of a man. Like Smithsonian’s
relationship with her love interest Donovan, Mahoney swooped in and saved her from
herself. The sob sister is always portrayed as a tough journalist but a woman who needs a
man to save her. Anderson needed Mahoney to tell her Krodt’s death and her own rape
were not her fault.
“It wasn’t your fault,” he said. The first time she’d heard a voice in the dark that
hadn’t made her want to cry. Or run. Or both.
“What wasn’t?”
“Any of it. Irina, Patty, and especially not Tony. You were sixteen for fuck’s
sake.”
“Seventeen.”
“Whatever. It wasn’t your fault. Nothing you did made him rape you. You don’t
have to spend the rest of your life trying to make amends.”
“But Irina…”
“Annie…” Chris shifted himself onto one elbow, his free hand stroking damp hair
out of her eyes. “Haven’t you been listening to anything I’ve said.”
Well, no, she hadn’t. She’d been the one talking.
“You exposed the man who brought Irina and a hundred like her to Britain, used
and abused her and sold her into sexual slavery. Thanks to you, he’s in jail,
awaiting trial for murder. Yes, Irina’s dead, but he killed her, you didn’t. And
you’ve saved many other girls who might have gone the same way.”
82

Lydia Miller doesn’t let any stereotyping about her fashion writing career bother her,
because she doesn’t care what people think of. She actually prefers to be underestimated,
just so she could prove a person wrong. Miller begins investigating the drowning of
Auerbach on her own, much to the dismay of Detective Barolini, who thinks she is the
murderer.
When Detectives Barolini and Kramer come to her apartment to tell her she is a
suspect, Miller is aware of Barolini’s dislike for her. He thinks she is an unintelligent,

28

vapid ex-model uses seduction to outsmart the police. In fiction, “female reporters can
achieve Pultizer Prizes, answer to no one, and see their byline on the front page at least
once a week; or they can be hyper-sexualized, passive, incompetent journalists who stick
to what they know—fashion, lifestyle, and romance.”
83
He also believes she murdered
Auerbach for his money. “Barolini eyed her suspiciously as she put the tray on the
counter beside the stove. Her T-shirt had shrunk. Probably he thought she was out to
seduce him.”
84

Miller doesn’t want to move up in the journalism world, her career at the
magazine is enough. She does her work on the “Chic to Chic” column and gets paid.
She is the epitome of a sob sister—she writes about “soft” news and needs rescuing when
in dangerous situations by her love interest, Detective Kramer. However, when she starts
investigating the drowning, her journalistic instincts kick in and she works on solving the
crime and writing a story based on her findings.
She finally quits her job, but unlike Monaghan, who leaves to write a book and
stop thinking about her divorce, Miller wants to work for an animal shelter, called Nora’s
Ark. When Miller tells Forte she is quitting to work for a shelter, her editor thinks it’s a
joke. “I’m thinking of abandoned animals, that’s what. I’ve wanted to do something
about it ever since I was a kid and people dumped them on our property. We lived on the
outskirts of town, near the woods. I guess people expected their sheltered pets to forage
for themselves. I took them in and kept them in Dad’s warehouse—he was in the
moving-and-storage business—until gradually they overran the place and he put a stop to
it.”
85

29

Monaghan eventually comes back to the magazine industry but Miller does not.
She continues her work at Nora’s Ark and doesn’t look back at her decision to leave her
career as a fashion writer.
The character, Amanda Roberts, like Smithsonian, Anderson, and Miller, doesn’t
want to fall in love. All characters prioritize journalism above finding love.
Smithsonian loves Donovan, but tries to deny her feelings in the beginning. She
wants to remain focused on her job but yearns for Donovan to want her. “She took a
deep breath and a sip of wine. Shut up, Lacey, Lacey. ‘I always thought you were
interested in me. Attracted to me.’ He nodded. ‘Was it only because there were so few
women there? Or were you on the rebound from your wife? Or were you just hazing me
because I was the girl reporter and you were the alpha cop?’”
86

Cool and confident Smithsonian begins to question herself when she sees that
Donovan no longer wants her. “A movie female reporter…was considered an equal by
doing a man’s work, a career woman drinking and arguing toe-to-toe with any male in the
shop, and holding her own against everyone. Yet this tough reporter often showed her
soft side and cried long and hard when the man she loved treated her like a sister instead
of a lover.”
87

“’The truth is, Vic, I don’t want to be your friend. It’s too hard. I can’t deal with
just being your friend and watching you waltz off with that barracuda, Josephine.’”
88

Their complicated relationship is woven throughout the series. Toward the end of
the book, Donovan and Smithsonian are always together. Their steady relationship is
always short-lived—in the beginning of every novel, their relationship fizzles or cannot

30

be because of outside sources.
89
In the end, like most of the 1940s films, the woman
gives up journalism to get married and have children. Toward the end of each novel,
Smithsonian reunites with Donovan and imagines their happy life together, although she
doesn’t quit her job.
The Stunt Reporter

I never trust anyone who says trust me.
90

—Lydia Miller

A stunt reporter “boldly challenged the value of experts’ neutrality, insisting
instead on the significance of their own bodies as sources of knowledge.”
91
Anderson
and Miller gladly put themselves in harms way for the sake of the story. The women find
co-workers assaulted in an alley, witness a source murdered while researching the story,
and discover a drowning. The stories all find their way to each journalist, and their
instincts kick in and they all follow through by investigating the crimes, each becoming
part of the story.
In each book, Smithsonian stumbles in the midst of a case. While getting ready in
the bathroom, she receives a phone call pleading for help in the alley by the newsroom.
When she arrives, Smithsonian sees Cassandra Wentworth unconscious and bleeding on
the ground. She finds the victim, even though she didn’t want to have anything to do
with Wentworth. Even Donovan, her boyfriend, knows Smithsonian’s uncanny knack for
becoming part of a criminal story in some way, whether she likes it or not. “‘Au
contraire, my sweet reporter. I have all the faith in the world in your ability to get
involved where you don’t need to. Smithsonian rushes in where angels fear to tread.’”
92

31

Her notoriety grows and even Trujillo’s current companion knows of
Smithsonian’s escapades. “‘Why, Tony talks about you all the time! Is it true y’all’re
always getting into trouble? And so creatively?’”
93
In each book, Smithsonian becomes
part of the story and that causes her editor deep distress. He tells Smithsonian that he
must drink Pepto-Bismol because of her and her talent for getting into trouble.
For Anderson, she was following her source to a party, when the story fell to her
feet. “In Woods’ series, Roberts is constantly at the center of the unfolding action, even
when she knows her actions are not appropriate journalism procedure.”
94
Anderson not
only chats with his friends, but drinks heavily too, even though she knows it’s not
appropriate.
During the party Mailer threw to celebrate his fashion show, a masked man
comes in with a gun, and asks for valuables. “As Annie squinted around the restroom
floor at the people with whom she’d spent the last few hours, their faces now gray with
fear and intimations of mortality, she made her decision: She wouldn’t look at the
gunman’s eyes again. She should be looking him in the face, memorizing every feature,
ready to describe each scowl and facial tic, but she couldn’t. More than that, she
wouldn’t.”
95
The terror Anderson felt paralyzes her during the crime. “There was a
pause that stretched into a silence. Annie could feel her heart pounding in her chest, hear
the breath of the other hostages around her.”
96

Mailer tries to take down the gunman but he is shot in the chest, instantly killed.
At the hospital, Anderson is still trying to recover from the shock of seeing a man killed
point blank in front of her and being taken hostage. She thinks of Krodt and one of her

32

conversations she had with the young girl before she was murdered. “Get through the
first twenty-four hours and you can survive anything, Irina had told her. Irina was fifteen
at the time, sitting in a Kings Cross café talking about when her parents were murdered
and what came next.”
97

While being interrogated by police, Anderson remembers something unusual with
the gunmen—that he was carefully reading his hostages’ drivers licenses, as if he was
looking for someone. “‘It didn’t seem random,’ she said finally. ‘It seemed like he was
looking for something, or someone, from the minute he burst into the bar. Maybe it was
Mark.’”
98

Like Anderson, Roberts finds herself in the wrong place at the wrong time. “And
while Roberts does not always purposely insert herself into a situation to get a story like
the stunt reporters of the past, she indirectly becomes part of the story, creating the very
news she intends to report and putting herself in danger.”
99
Journalists swarm the scene,
trying to piece together the crime. Anderson realizes that she has something all reporters
envy—a firsthand account of the murder and the last interview of the late Mailer. “The
female stunt reporter is perhaps one of the most dramatic, yet poignant portrayals of a
female journalist. Historically, stunt reporters literally placed themselves in the midst of
the story, going to any lengths necessary to get the inside scoop. Their bodies became
part of the news…”
100

The journalist in her realizes her golden opportunity. “As memories of the Post
crashed around her, Annie’s brain finally kicked into high gear. It didn’t matter where
she’d been hiding herself. Or who she was, for that matter, because Annie was back and

33

she, Annie Anderson, had Mark Mailer’s last-ever interview. It wasn’t the best she’d ever
pulled off, not exactly hard-hitting and incisive, but it was still an exclusive. The last
words Mark Mailer would ever speak on the record.”
101

Anderson sees the inaccurate headlines in the national newspapers describing his
death as a random act of violence and she becomes determined to prove that he was
targeted by the gunman. “Annie had two options. Annie Anderson, Fashion Editor,
could leave it, go back to the hotel, and get a decent night’s sleep. Annie Anderson, ex-
chief-investigative-reporter, could crowbar the lid off another can of worms.”
102

During her investigation, Anderson knows she is being followed and as a
precaution, carries the recordings of the interview she did with Mailer, eventually mailing
them to her former editor for safekeeping. She senses the danger and does what she can
to protect the story, not herself. Roberts “enrolls in a cooking class to scope out a suspect
for a murder case she is writing a story about.”
103

Like Smithsonian and Anderson, Miller cannot help but stumble onto murders.
“Lydia crouched beside him and looked down. Blood pounded in her ears at the sight of
a pale round Buddha stomach in khaki swim trunks. Adam! Her head began to spin.
The backs of her knees started to give way and her whole body trembled. He couldn’t be
drowned. Not dead. Not Adam. Not after Mark. No one was going to die on her again.
She wouldn’t allow it.”
104
Miller’s futile attempts to resuscitate Auerbach prove useless.
Although the hospital blames his death on a heart attack, Miller believes he was
murdered. Miller feels as if she caused the death and blames herself. “Mark had died in

34

August, now Adam in September. It was as if anyone she cared for died. Maybe she
should love only her enemies.”
105

In Killer Hair Smithsonian becomes the story as the killer starts sending
threatening mail and assaults her in the park. In the end, she catches the killer by
defending herself with scissors. Her photo and the story title are on the cover of the
newspaper. Mac and Donovan are also constantly telling Smithsonian to not get involved
with crime and even though she complies, she always ends up as the story. “And while
Roberts does not always purposely insert herself into a situation to get a story like the
stunt reporters of the past, she indirectly becomes part of the story, creating the very news
she intends to report and putting herself in physical danger.
106

Each novel has Smithsonian stumbling into a crime and becoming involved with
it personally, causing her fellow co-workers to want to change jobs with her. The junior
crime reporter, Kelly Kavanaugh, wants to switch to the fashion beat.
Mac had a gleam in his eye. “Kelly Kavanaugh’s been sniffing around your beat,
you know,” he said.
“Kavanaugh of the cops beat? Khakis and sneakers, more freckles than sense?”
Lacey was taken aback. “She’s interested in the fashion beat? What for?”
“She says she thinks it might be interesting, all those weird crime stories you
work. Says maybe she could bring something new to the fashion beat.”
107

Miller inadvertently went after the story and found herself in the middle of the
investigation in order to clear her name. She doesn’t write a story about how she solved
the crimes or use it to better her career.
She lives her life and finds herself in the middle of another investigation, but this
time not as a journalist. She quits the magazine in search of something with purpose and
decides to volunteer at a local animal shelter. While there, she stops a burglary and also

35

follows a lead on a case of animal cruelty—a company that is illegally using shelter
animals to create a serum called Anima that makes people look younger.
Stunt reporters also find themselves suspects in crimes and need to continue
investigating in order to clear their names. Auerbach’s neighbor and friend, Dr. Carlos
Fernando Alejandro Urzaga finds Miller in the pool struggling to get him out of the
water. Because of how she was found, the detectives and Auerbach’s ex-wife, Vanessa
Auerbach, believe she murdered him in cold blood. With the allegations, she finds
herself a suspect in the drowning and is determined to clear her name and find out what
really happened. “Is that what you’re accusing me of? Murder? I thought this was
supposed to be just routine questioning. I’m not answering anything more without a
lawyer.”
108

Like Miller, Roberts also is accused of something she didn’t do “as she is framed
for stealing a Civil War artifact and then imprisoned by the crooked sheriff who wants to
throw her investigation off track.”
109

When Miller asks why she is being suspected, Detective Barolini tells her a
waitress described someone who looks like her at the same restaurant with Auerbach the
night he was killed. “Tall, blond, skinny, snotty. Her words, not mine.”
110
Miller cannot
believe she is being suspected because she looks like someone who was with Auerbach
that night. “I’m sure there are a lot of tall, blond, skinny women out there. I told you I
wasn’t at Megan’s Sunday. Anyway, snotty is a value judgment.”
111

36

The Victim

The female reporter’s victimization throughout each series is a reminder of the
violence against women depicted in many classic films and novels. Roberts also finds
herself in situations where she is hurt. Her “encounters are perpetrated by anonymous
male figures—masked men, men lurking in the dark, or men who try to commit violence
from a distance using weapons or threatening letters.”
112

Like Roberts, Smithsonian gets assaulted, threatened and attacked throughout the
series. Anderson too is a victim as she investigates for stories, but she stands out from
the other journalists. While the other women—Smithsonian, Roberts and Miller—all
seem to get out of dangerous situations moments before they are gravely wounded or
attacked, Anderson is already a victim of a brutal sexual assault. While the rape didn’t
occur during her journalistic career, it victimized her before she began. The excruciating
details of the rape explain Anderson’s reaction when she is getting threatened, or attacked
while on the job.
In Killer Hair, Smithsonian stabs the murderer with scissors and is able to fend
for herself toward the end of the novel. However, she is assaulted in the woods by the
same murderer earlier in the book. While in some cases she can take care of herself, she
still is victimized in the series.
In Armed and Glamorous, a bomb goes off and a male protects her. She receives
a threatening letter warning her of further harm if she continues to investigate the story.
There was a loud explosion, followed immediately by a second. The classroom
windows shattered and glass shards sprayed across the room like daggers. Hunt
instinctively threw himself across Lacey to protect her, but she’d already hit the
floor, covered with hot coffee, doughnuts, and jagged glass.

37

When Lacey got home it was late. Her eyes burned, her muscles ached, and she
was tired to the bone. A folded piece of paper was peeking out from underneath
her apartment door. Her keys in her hand, she bent down to pull it out by one
corner. It wasn’t the usual flyer for the local Chinese restaurant, or another plea
from the landlord to keep the lobby doors closed. It was a message, scrawled in
block letters with a thick black marker.

SMITHSONIAN: TONIGHT WAS JUST A FRIENDLY WARNING! STOP
ASKING QUESTIONS. DON’T LOOK FOR TROUBLE. YOU MIGHT BE
THE NEXT DEAD DUCK. A FRIEND.
113

Terrified by the note, she tells Donovan about it and he comes to protect her.
When Smithsonian is attacked, she is moments away from being killed or
seriously injured. However, Donovan always comes to the rescue and saves her life by
beating up Smithsonian’s attacker. “Occasionally, the sob sister shows signs of feminine
frailty. Most female reporters eventually need rescuing by the most available male.”
114

Smithsonian is the object of a murderer in Grave Apparel, and fights for her life, only to
be saved by Donovan.
Wilcox grabbed Lacey’s staff and gave it a vicious pull, knocking her off balance.
She let go and fell in the snow. She tried to roll away, but Wilcox was right on
top of her. She looked up and saw him lift the staff high over her head to strike.
Another snowball pasted him in the face and he shook his head. The girls were
screaming and Wilcox was growling and Lacey was scrabbling to get to her feet
in the muck, and suddenly there was Vic Donovan, diving at Wilcox in a flying
leap and bowling him over backward into the dirty snow.”
115

While on a walk, Smithsonian becomes the object of an obsessed murderer who follows
her and assaults her. No one is there to rescue her but the sound of a dog growling scares
the attacker away:
She heard a twig snap behind her as she climbed over the damaged tree. A
leather-gloved hand abruptly closed over her mouth and another, the right,
grabbed her around the waist. Lacey struggled as she was dragged backwards
toward the dense woods. She assumed it was a man, but not a huge man.”
116

38

The attacker puts a knife to her throat and cuts a piece of her hair. He threatens her and
warns her to stop investigating the story. A dog appears and begins growling at the
masked man, which scares him away.
The attack rocks Smithsonian to her core, thoroughly frightening her. To be
helpless and alone haunts Smithsonian, the strong-willed reporter. She is unhappy that
the attack is still on her mind, even after the attacker, Beau Radford, is in jail. In order to
overcome her fear, Smithsonian decides to take a walk to the woods and back to the place
where the attack took place.
…Walking down the trail meant returning to the scene of a skirmish she had lost,
lost on her own turf, and it might easily have been much worse.
She began at a slow stroll, but her heart started pounding and her throat went dry.
She felt a chill and realized she was shaking. That made her angry, angry at the
infamous Shampoo Boy, angry at herself for being such a wimp. She was gaining
speed.
117

Donovan is sitting at the spot in the forest, there to support her so she doesn’t have to
relive the ordeal alone. “She turned left at the bend up to a small footbridge and realized
she wasn’t alone. He was sitting on the post, his face warmed by the sun. Blue work
shirt and cowboy hat. Blue jeans that fit like temptation. His eyes seemed to be
closed.”
118

Her fear is replaced by anger at the attacker. “Reporters do occasionally receive
death threats, usually in the course of doing something brave, like covering a war zone, or
exposing a crime boss. But not lifestyle reporters. Not Lacey. ‘Good God, I cover
fashion!’ She said it aloud to the cardinals, who had not yet shown her their red coats.”
119

A piece of her hair gets sliced off by the attacker, which upsets Smithsonian, because she

39

has hair styled like a movie siren. The front is now uneven, which to her means a hair
emergency.
If Donovan is not present, Smithsonian relies on her friends or family for help. In
Hostile Makeover, Lacey’s mother Rose and sister Cherise save Lacey’s life from a
killer. Cherise, a former cheerleader who famously high-kicked a quarterback during a
high school football game, delivered a knockout blow to the killer. “Cherise delivered
her stunning high kick to his jaw. Lacey had never seen her in such perfect cheerleader
form. Cherise’s new tan pump connected with Penfield’s jaw at the very apex of her
kick, knocking him out cold.”
120

In France, Smithsonian is looking for a corset in a basement, only to be grabbed
from behind and forced to smell a chemical that causes her to lose consciousness. “From
behind the coal room door, one large hand reached out and knocked the pry bar from her
hand. She struggled with her unseen assailant for a moment before another large hand
pressed a cloth to her face and the chemical smell filled her head. Everything faded to
black.”
121
Smithsonian awakes and realizes she is being watched by someone. She
realizes she was mistaken to believe she was safe and able to take care of herself. Like
the assault in the woods in Killer Hair, the attack in France is a reminder to Smithsonian
of her powerlessness and to readers, the victimization of women.
Smithsonian’s co-worker Wentworth is attacked in the alley near the newsroom.
Wentworth was hit on the head by a man dressed as Santa and left there for dead. The
brutal attack is on a strong-minded woman, someone who seems to be able to take care of
herself. Many of Wentworth’s co-workers hated her for her confidence and bluntness.

40

An attack on the strongest reporter shows that no one is safe from becoming a victim of a
crime. “The image of a strong woman made weak at the hands of men moves beyond
fantasy to become an expectation for readers.”
122
When Smithsonian finds Wentworth,
she is shocked by how close to work crime happens.
Roberts is the victim in a similar situation. Like Wentworth, she is attacked at the
newsroom and hit on the head by a faceless attacker. While in the hospital, Wentworth
tries to remember what happened but isn’t able to get past the terror of the incident. The
so-called strong woman of the newsroom is reduced to a weak and helpless female.
Roberts does not feel the same way as Wentworth. “Finding herself in many near-death
encounters makes Roberts nonchalant about death threats, menacing phone calls, stalkers,
and attackers. In fact, these frightening situations affect those around her, particularly
Donelli, more than they affect Roberts herself.”
123

She alienates herself and throws herself in her work, which proves to be
dangerous when she is targeted by the murderers. Like Smithsonian, Anderson is attacked
and victimized because of a story. In Fashion Victim, Anderson is followed through a
corridor and assaulted. “That was when Annie heard another set of footsteps to one side.
She never heard the man who coshed her, he’d been walking on grass. She just felt
something very heavy hit the back of her head.”
124
She was targeted because of the
recordings she had made of Mailer’s last interview. She is taken and tied up by Ugi
Baroni, who wants the recordings in order to protect his business. Anderson is not afraid,
even though they use violence to get her to reveal the location of the tapes. “His look

41

didn’t scare her. She understood the man standing in front of her now. The vanity, the
charm…He was Tony Panton in better clothes, amoral and spoiled. Tony with a gun.”
Anderson flies into New York on the eve of Fashion Week. The reader quickly
realizes that Anderson is not the heroic, tough journalist her co-workers thought she was
before she quit. Her fragility is quickly shown when she is alone in her hotel room. Any
tough façade is quickly replaced by who she is—a scared, lonely woman. She triple
checks her doors and sleeps with the light on—afraid of a monster—one that she had
seen as a 17-year-old girl. For her, the monster is real and caused her enough emotional
damage that changed the way she views the world, especially the way she views men.
Men to her are out to hurt her and can’t be trusted.
She checked the door instinctively to see if she’d remembered to double-lock it
and then checked again, making herself note that it was very definitely locked.
That way a third check would not be necessary. Common sense and every other
sense Annie possessed told her there was no one but her in the room, but she
couldn’t kick her brain’s certainty that someone had been watching in the dark,
hunting her. It was an old dream, a well-trodden 3 A.M. path in other rooms in
other parts of the world, and she knew she wasn’t alone; every woman suffered it
sometime. But for Annie it was as familiar as family and about as welcome.
125

Planton, the monster in her dreams, was a reality that frightened her. He had hurt her
once and she hasn’t been able to forget it.
Only the wind and only memories. Those things filed away with a promise to
herself that she’d examine them later. But she never did. Tony had seen to that,
ensuring she had more memories than one girl could stand. Annie was no fool.
She knew that in some bizarre way she owed her career to Tony; her career and
her anger, because one fed off the other. Not a good feeling.
126

In Deadly Beautiful, Anderson figures out that missing model Ulrich isn’t dead but hiding
out. After a long day of searching for clues of her whereabouts, Anderson walks back to
her hotel room, only to find that she was followed home. “A man’s arm was around her

42

neck. It was a slick, quick move, too fast for Annie to do anything but register the
professionalism of the attack before fear came flooding in. Instinct made her struggle.
All that happened was that his arm tightened, and a hand slapped across her mouth before
Annie could scream.”
127

One night, she comes back to her hotel room after a fashion show and finds roses
from him sitting on the table. Since she’s been with Mahoney, whom she told him about
Panton, her nightmares have subsided and her rape less frequent in her mind. The roses
bring Anderson back to how she felt when she was 17.
Tiny hairs rose on her forearms and sweat beaded the back of her neck. She
couldn’t breathe, except that was ridiculous. Annie felt as if someone had
punched her. No, she felt as if someone had punched her. No, she felt as if
someone was about to punch her and that was worse. Her whole body was
tensing around a knot in her stomach.
128

Anderson recalls her violent relationship with Planton, who used violence to make her
submissive to him. The night of the rape, he was annoyed by Anderson, who made them
leave a party early. “That was when he slapped her. He’d simply stepped forward, raised
his hand, and did it. And that was when she locked herself in the bathroom.”
129

When she finally opened the door, he forced himself on her. “It wasn’t the first time
they’d had sex, it was the fifth, although the original occasion had also been Annie’s first.
It was, however, the first time he took her in anger, his hands yanking her little black
dress above her hip, his knees forcing her legs apart, as one arm wedged across her
throat, almost choking her as he held her to the floor.”
130

While walking Colombo around the city one evening, Miller comes across a
homeless man berating her and her dog. After Colombo continued to bark at him from

43

across the street, the homeless man tells Miller that large dogs don’t belong in the city.
‘“You’re going to get that sweet animal killed,” the drunk called from the other side. A
couple just coming out of the door of the Antico Caffee gave her a dirty look. “Neither
of us will be killed,” she assured Colombo, hoping she was right.’
131
As she continued to
walk home, Miller became aware that the street was deserted and the lone streetlight had
burned out, leaving it completely dark and ominous. Miller felt on edge and uneasy so
she quickly made it to her building with Colombo, preparing herself for an attack by
holding her keys in a ready position. “She fished her keys out of her jacket pocket and
held them so that they jutted out over her knuckles, a supposedly good way to defend
yourself—keys to the eyes and kicks to the crotch.”
132

As she was walking into her building, Miller was attacked.
She had one foot on the doorstep of her building when Colombo gave a low, mean
growl. With a sudden pull at the leash that caught her off guard, he broke away,
barking. Almost simultaneously an arm shot around her neck, the pressure
blocking off her windpipe. She couldn’t scream or make any kind of noise. She
couldn’t think straight, only struggle as hard as she could, wishing she’d worn her
cowboy boots with heels instead of sneakers.
133

All of her mental preparedness proved useless and Miller became a victim of violence.
“The grip tightened and blood roared in her ears. It was happening to her as it happened
to so many other women. She was going to be raped. Maybe killed.”
134

The attacker was the stereotypically faceless man, who attacked his female
victims when they were vulnerable and alone. “Behind her, he breathed heavily,
asthmatically. She felt warm, sour-smelling breath on the side of her face, then heard a
high-pitched curse and a groan and was released as suddenly as he’d been grabbed.”
135

Like Smithsonian, Miller is saved by a dog, specifically hers, Colombo, who attacks the

44

man and chases him away down an alley while barking ferociously. “Colombo was close
on his heels, his barking starting up all the dogs in the neighborhood. A man yelled out
the window to be quiet or he’d call the cops. Good!”
136

Miller ran after Colombo and the mugger in order to get a look at his face.
Unfortunately, the man jumped into a cab and Miller was unable to see who it was.
However, she realizes that Colombo save her life, as she stands next to him while he is
still barking at a cab that was pulling out the street. “Colombo stood looking as confused
as she felt. He came trotting back to her, the metal tip of his leash clicking on the
cement. ‘Good dog. Brave dog,’ she told him. He wagged his tail and walked tall.”
137

The two begin their trek back to her apartment, but Miller is so shaken by the
attack that she begins to go in shock. To be attacked by her home jars her very being.
Her false sense of security frightens her, and she realizes that if Colombo weren’t there,
the outcome could have been far more violent.
Passing the drop-in center with the clothes piled up on the giveaway tables, she
started to shake, her knees almost buckling. She put her hand to her neck where it
hurt from the pressure of her assailant’s grip. She remembered the hammerlock
cutting of her breath and her futile kicking and struggling.
138

Toward the end of In Murder We Trust, Miller is chased by a serial killer (Dr. Urzaga)
and a crazed murderer who killed Auerbach (Todd Bigelow). She is running for her life
with Carolyn Auerbach, Adam Auerbach’s second wife. The two women are being
chased by both killers. Detectives Kramer and Barolini are able to arrest Bigelow, and
Miller successfully solves the serial murders on her own and stops the serial killer,
Urzaga, at the same time. She doesn’t need a man’s help and catches the serial killer on
her own, even after he tries to kill her. “She felt the trapdoor lift underfoot. Heard

45

Urzaga’s grunts beneath her. Feeling herself tilt forward, she looked down and saw a
hand had crept out. A hand with a knife. She raised a booted foot and came down on the
hand with her heel, hearing a gratifying howl of pain.”
139

The women each experience frightening encounters while investigating the
stories. The victimization of women has been a common theme, so much so that readers
now expect it to happen.

46

CHAPTER FOUR: THE LONELY FACTOR

If all else fails, ransack the mini bar.
140

—Annie Anderson

All three journalists prefer being alone, although for different reasons. They find
themselves alone when they’re investigating a story and when they are attacked. One
way or another, they are left to their own devices to fend for themselves, and, in then end,
need a man to rescue them. Their co-workers all distance themselves from each other
making their work environment feel competitive and hostile. Even though they prioritize
journalism over finding love, they each find a love interest. While they don’t have a
dominating male in their professional lives, all three women have headstrong men in their
love lives. The male superiority is evident through each series. History has always
placed women under the control of a man—whether it be a boyfriend, husband, or a boss.
Even today, the inequality of men and women is still a debated topic—in the workplace
and in relationships.
Roberts is no different from the women. She too must work alone, because she is
the only female reporter at her paper. “The higher the women climb up the ladder, the
more alone they find themselves. Male colleagues doubt her intelligence, her skill, and
her ambition.”
141
Smithsonian’s workplace has only a handful of women, but Anderson
and Miller work at fashion magazines, where there are almost no men. “Female
colleagues, when they exist, see her as competition or an enemy, never an ally, because
they have taught themselves to work alone and to depend on no one to assure that their
work is done accurately.”
142

47

Smithsonian prefers to work on stories alone but her friends and family worry
about her and go with her during investigations. When she goes off to Paris, Smithsonian
brings along her friend Barton, and they scour the city for a corset filled with jewels.
Throughout their journey, Barton is there to support Smithsonian and doesn’t let her feel
lonely. In Armed and Glamorous, Barton and Smithsonian must save LeBlanc from a
crazed killer. The two women race to a cliff and risk their lives to save her, almost
getting killed in the end. Smithsonian’s friends mean everything to her and she is willing
to sacrifice herself. Roberts alienates herself from the world and isn’t able to form such
close bonds as Smithsonian has.
While Smithsonian leans on her friends and family, Anderson and Roberts
alienate themselves and accept the fact that they will never belong. They keep people at
a distance and as a result, people never get to see their real selves, only what they
perceive of them.
Anderson was a successful, award-winning investigative journalist. Like
Monaghan, she already proved herself to her peers. She focused on her career so much
and didn’t have a chance to find love. Monaghan also avoided relationships so she could
focus on her career. “At 42, she had been the editor of Chic magazine for six years, and
was considered an icon in the fashion world.”
143

In The Devil Wears Prada, Sachs strives to please Priestley and show her that she
is dedicated to her job as her assistant. Although she begins her job with a boyfriend,
Alex, her commitment to building her career came at a price—her relationship. She

48

pushes away Alex and her friends, who cannot understand why her job means so much to
her.
Anderson’s lack of friends is of her own doing, as she cannot fully connect with
others and is not only distrustful of others because of her former job as an investigative
reporter, but also her rape. Her lone friend, McCartney, is the antithesis of Anderson.
Lou and Annie had joined the Post in the same month and were the same age.
Only their star signs and different hair colors were different—Annie’s dark brown
hair had always resisted her halfhearted attempts at DIY bleach, while Lou’s
came out of a professional’s bottle and was topped up every six to eight weeks.
They’d hit it off instantly, a rare occurrence for Annie and one that hadn’t been
repeated since. She could count the people she regarded as real friends on less
than one hand. Life was easier that way.
144

However, McCartney is unaware of her secret in the Fashion Victim. Her closest friend
does not know her darkest secret. “The story of my life, she thought bitterly. Always the
outsider, until she met Tony Panton. An icy wind bit at Annie’s face, making her eyes
water. Only the wind, Annie told herself, swiping away tears, nothing more.”
145

Both women, Anderson and Roberts, have trouble adjusting to their new jobs, as
they are both used to working for a top paper and a hard-to-please editor. They are also
aware that they excel as investigative reporters and have the awards to prove their talent.
“Amanda Roberts had grown up in Manhattan, she’d gotten her journalism degree from
Columbia and her law degree from Harvard, and she’d had every intention of building a
career as one of the best investigative reporters in the country.”
146

The women don’t want love because of cheating, lying, or abusive men they’ve
been with in the past. Smithsonian is hesitant to date Donovan because he initially lied to
her. In Colorado, she found out Donovan was still technically married when he was

49

romancing her. Anderson was in an abusive relationship, and Miller’s husband cheated
on her with a man.
After Smithsonian found out about Montana Donovan, she began a relationship
with a rancher in Sagebrush. She became involved with the rancher to rebound from
Donovan. The reader isn’t given any information or even a name for the rancher,
showing how insignificant he is to her. Smithsonian ran off to D.C. after he proposed to
her because she didn’t want to be tied down to such a small town or to a man. “She
couldn’t imagine being embalmed in a barren, claustrophobic little boomtown where the
temperature often touched forty below in the winter. And he wasn’t the right guy for her
to be embalmed with anyway. Lacey told the cowboy no, and then she hot-footed it out
of town.”
147

After Roberts discovers her husband’s infidelities, she is shaken to her core and
cannot believe something like that happened to what she thought was a loving husband
and marriage. The stability of her marriage had kept her sane and focused on her work,
and without it, Roberts doesn’t feel like herself. “I’ve always known what I wanted out
of life. I worked damn hard to get where I was as a reporter. I was respected. I was in
control. I always felt secure about my personal life, too, until Mack walked out. It was
really the first thing to ever really go wrong for me. It shook me to see how easily that
control could slip away.”
148

For Anderson, men are also a complicated subject. She avoids relationships like
Roberts and doesn’t want anything to do with men. Her last boyfriend, Nick, had left her
because he felt Anderson was too distant. She never loved him and admitted that she

50

kept him around like a safety blanket. “The man was just furniture, a security blanket
she’d slept with occasionally, a live-in alarm system. She told herself she hadn’t really
cared whether he stayed or went. Until he went.”
149

While Anderson doesn’t want to label herself a victim, she does see herself as
someone who was too weak and too naïve to prevent something like that from happening
to her. The toll the secret rape has on Anderson prevents her from having a proper love
and social life.
When she does meet someone, Mahoney, she is hesitant to admit that she likes
him because of what happened to her. She decides to sleep with him on a whim, only to
wake up and regret it. “Chris rolled over, not that there was far to roll on her single bed,
his arm reaching across her hips. The casual intimacy of the move discomforted her. He
was too close, his skin next to her skin, the warmth of his sleep-filled breath on her body.
She wasn’t used to this; Annie was normally long gone by now.”
150
She is used to being
alone that the intimacy they shared is uncomfortable for her.
Miller’s reluctance to begin a relationship mirrors that of Roberts. Like the
character, Miller does not want to be involved with any man, because of what a man has
done to her. Mark was the third man Miller had ever been with. “The first, Jamie, whom
she had latched on to in her freshman year in high school, had dumped her in their
freshman year at Ohio State. She’d dropped out and gone to New York to forget him,
and at age nineteen become involved with a guitarist named Lyle in a rock group called
the Nervous Wrecks. Their romance didn’t last a third as long as her misery after Lyle
left her for a groupie admirer. Then she’d met Mark. And he’d abandoned her, too.”
151

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Mark worked as a photographer for Gazelle and was a closeted gay. Miller had
no idea of the fact until he told her he had AIDS. “They’d lived together for a year
before the three years they were married, and she’d never guessed. If anything, she’d
suspected him of sleeping with the gorgeous female models he accompanied on
shoots.”
152
She was also devastated by his admitting to numerous extramarital affairs
while married to her. “When the truth came out, she’d felt anger at her naivete then
terror. For him. For herself. Terror and betrayal. How could he have loved her and
slept around—regardless of what sex he had sex with? It still hurt when she thought of
it.”
153
Even though he admitted his indiscretions and that he was gay, Miller took care of
him until he died. “You looked after Mark when his boyfriend ran off. That’s the
important thing. You’re a tough kid. A stand-up chick, as Adam used to say.”
154

When she found out her husband was gay and contracted HIV through risky sex
with men, Miller was terrified of contracting it from him, even though he always wore
condoms with her. His betrayal of her caused her to swear off all men. “From now on
men would play no part in her life, other than friends. So far her tests had proved HIV-
negative—thank God and knock wood—so it wasn’t completely fear of destroying
someone’s life. She just didn’t want to get hurt again.”
155

She is so shaken by her loss of Mark to AIDS and the risk he put her in while he
kept it serious, Miller is uncertain she will ever move on. “It scares me. If I come out of
this intact, I doubt I’ll ever sleep with anyone again. I’m beginning to think there’s no
such thing as safe sex.”
156

52

Suarez discovers that to be successful, “you have to dedicate your life to your
career.”
157
She gladly takes up that task as she truly loves journalism, but her family is
her priority. She wants to succeed in her career but when her family needs her, she tries
to be there for them. “Being very dedicated to her family, Suarez constantly feels torn
between work and home.”
158
Miller doesn’t want to get a promotion, rather she wants to
get away from her job and actually quits in the second novel. Her family doesn’t play a
big part in her life but they slowly begin to. Miller and her sister, Charlotte had a falling
out prior to Mark’s death and no longer talk to each other. Charlotte moved in with their
mother after she found her husband, Hughie left her and their children for another
women. Miller came to her family for comfort after finding out her husband had AIDS.
Instead of getting advice and support, Miller was taken aback by her sister’s and mother’s
reaction. Her mom comforted her only a little, “as much as her mother’s Midwest
morality would allow when she discovered her daughter had not only married a gay man
but also one who had gotten an incurable disease. Clearly she didn’t understand how
such things could happen. Neither did Lydia.”
159

She lives in New York and her mom and sister still live in their childhood home
in Ohio. Miller visits them very rarely and for short periods of time. She doesn’t have
the close relationship with her family like Suarez, but she begins to let them in her life.
Charlotte’s reaction was less understanding because she was still reeling from her
husband’s newly discovered infidelity. When Miller described Hughie as “another
deadbeat dad” in front of Charlotte, Charlotte had “flown into a rage. Instead of blaming

53

Hughie, it was Mark she’d faulted. ‘At least Hughie’s a real man and not some
queer.”’
160

Whereas Betty Suarez is continually upbeat and positive and constantly trying to
help others while on the job, Anderson alienates herself from others. Suarez doesn’t look
for relationships even though she is always juggling boys. Mode magazine journalists are
similar to The Eye Street Observer journalists in that they are competitive with another.
“This story is mine, Mac. All mine. I researched it. It’s my beat and my sources.”
161

Both groups of journalists don’t like sharing sources and get territorial with their beats.
162

“The employees at Mode interact with each other out of necessity, and most do not have
close bonds within the office. These journalists, unlike the close-knit staff of The Mary
Tyler Moore Show or Murphy Brown, have personal agendas that they consider before the
good of the magazine.”
163
Johnson despises Smithsonian because her stories are
constantly spilling over into the government beat, which he works on. He thinks she is an
incompetent fashion reporter and not good enough for covering politics. His outwardly
rude behavior and contempt for Smithsonian runs throughout the series and his suspicions
regarding her motives grow in each book. “‘He’s under the mistaken impression that I’m
trying to steal his beat. As if.’”
164

Trujillo also thinks Smithsonian wants to take his beat, but instead of being
obviously rude to her, he tries to one-up her or join forces with her and become partners
and eventually share a byline. “Like hell! I’m breaking it and I’m not giving Tony
squat.”
165
Smithsonian tries to keep her stories to herself, but does begrudgingly agree to
work with him if it does mean she can have more time for herself.

54

He suggested they go for beer after work. She suggested a rain check. He
suggested they chat about what she had. She suggested he take a hike so she
could wrap up the story on deadline. He suggested he might be able to help her
with the possible criminal angle. She suggested a place he could stick his angle
and offered him help. He got the hint. He smiled the killer smile again as he left,
but was down to about sixty watts. Lacey smiled to herself. He’ll be back.
166

…Tony had cojones. He would either try to take the story away from Lacey, or
debunk it. He had the heart and soul of a cop reporter. If murder was involved
and The Eye could score a point on the District’s cops, Trujillo would be sure to
grab that feather for his own cap. She couldn’t let that happen.
167

He is also a friend to her. Even though they sometimes bicker and flirt, he is always there
for her. When Smithsonian is threatened, Trujillo takes her phone (newly given by Mac
who believes she needs to be current with technology, unlike the ’40s journalists she
admires) and puts his number in, letting her know he is always there for her.
In contrast to the writers at Mode, when a co-worker is threatened from The Eye
newsroom, the writers look out for each other. When a fellow Eye writer is in trouble,
differences and competitiveness are put aside and the focus is keeping the person safe.
Wentworth is hated by a lot of people in the newsroom, but after her assault, Smithsonian
and the rest of the staff race to find out what happened. “Even if Cassandra wasn’t well
loved, she was a fellow journalist. Assaulting her was like attacking their newspaper.”
168

Even though Lacey despises her, she does relent and helps solve the case.
In Ugly Betty, Suarez’s co-workers do help her, but most of the time their
competitive nature takes over. Their personal problems show their human side and the
viewer is able to sympathize in each of their individual plights. But because of
competitiveness on The Eye, the reader never fully sees the human side of the journalists.
People like Johnson, an egotistical male, seem to come from the past. He stereotypes

55

women into typical female roles—cooking, cleaning, fashion—his backward idea of what
a woman should be is reflected in how he treats Smithsonian. His possessiveness of all
things political and governmental shows how he still believes men should focus on that
aspect of life and that women are not good enough to cover it.
MODE magazine and Gazelle have the same type of work environment. The
hostile environment doesn’t seem to upset Miller in any way, as she is used to catty
women on the runways and she finds it normal.

56

CHAPTER FIVE: COVER GIRLS

You’re not that old, but you are a rogue. And yes, I would like a little information. I
want to pick your brains.
169

—Lacey Smithsonian

Clothes play an important role in the novels and readers can see what type of
attire the journalists are wearing while working on stories and talking to sources. As
women working in the fashion industry, clothes are a powerful tool. When they dress
stylish, they are playing the part of the stylish fashion reporter. In the early 20
th
century,
a woman was “expected to dress according to her femininity.”
170
While Smithsonian
takes great care in her appearance, Anderson and Miller do not. “Judgments are made
about a woman’s sexuality, self-confidence, and identity based on attire.”
171

The women have to choose between dressing professionally with masculine
clothes, or dressing more feminine, and in turn, taken less seriously and criticized by their
peers. When the women wear masculine clothing, they are taken more seriously by their
peers and their sources. Researcher Donna Born observed that “the way a woman dresses
does reflect on her ability as a journalist, or at least the way she is perceived in the
profession.”
172

Smithsonian’s fascination with the 1940s mirrors her own desires and ideals on
what a woman’s role should be. The police and Capitol Hill reporters are both male,
while feminine beats like fashion and food are filled by women. America was in the
midst of war during the 1940s and women replaced men in the workplace. “Women
journalists filled many jobs left by men, especially on the staffs of small-town
newspapers.”
173

57

Like the women of the 1940s, Smithsonian craves to replace the man—in her
case, a more “serious” beat. “Even though women had the right to vote, they rarely
covered politics or other forms of standard hard news. Editors told women they were
biologically unsuited to reporting. ‘The general temp—with the deadline-fighting
element always present—is such to bar many women because of nervous temperament.’
One reporting textbook by a city editor and a journalism professor stated, further
asserted, ‘Most women are incapable of covering police and court news.’”
174

Smithsonian inherited her style from her grandmother Mimi, who was a young
woman during the 1940s. Monaghan also dresses similarly to Smithsonian, with fashion
based on same 1940s style. Everything about the 1940s fascinates Smithsonian but
vintage clothes from that decade are her passion.
When she needs to be strong and confident, Lacey whips out her favorite vintage
suit. “For female actors, reporter roles gave them a chance to be top dog in a man’s
world and they jumped at it. Practically every major actress of the period showed up in
tailored coat and pants to fight the males in the newsroom, to assert her individualism and
independence.”
175

“Women who wore men’s suits, hats, etc., were often just calling attention to
themselves, not making a fashion statement. It took several more generations, Hollander
remarked, for women to achieve ‘a female way to wear clothes that look both sexually
interesting and ordinarily serious…at the same time, the way men did.’”
176

Smithsonian complements her vintage fashion with hair and make-up reminiscent
of 1940s movie stars. When a man (Beau Radford) attacked her in the woods,

58

Smithsonian was furious he cut off a piece of hair, destroying her hairdo. Panicked by
her awful madman’s haircut, Smithsonian made an emergency call to her stylist friend,
Stella LeBlanc for an impromptu haircut. “Bangs and shorter, fluffier hairstyle reflected
back at Lacey from the mirror. It was now more Betty Hutton than Lauren Bacall, more
Incendiary Blonde than The Big Sleep. ‘I know it’s a little more screwball comedy than
film noir, like you like,’ Stella said.”
177

Brenda Starr, the 1940s Sunday comic strip reporter, is very similar to
Smithsonian. “From the beginning Starr’s clothes helped define each generation’s taste
in women’s fashions. In the 1940s she sported open-toed shoes, monkey fur-trimmed
coat and flying-saucer hat.”
178

Similarly, Smithsonian resembles the 1930s journalist Torchy Blane of the movie
series. “Her frenetic energy, rapid-fire repartee, and man-tailored suits”
179
were her
trademark. Smithsonian has a similar style. Torchy Blane’s outfits consisted of “a
tailored jacket and a skirt of matching fabric, sometimes with a blouse under the jacket,
sometimes just an artfully arranged scarf.”
180

Blane’s make-up also played an important part in her look. Like Smithsonian, her
makeup added to her beauty. “In addition to rakish hats and man-tailored suits, she wore
makeup. Her Kewpie-doll looks were the result of eyebrow pencil, eye shadow, mascara,
rouge and lipstick, all deftly applied. The props and paint confirmed that Torchy knew
the traditional feminine role and was ready to play it. Even in the midst of murders, bank
robberies, and scoops, she had the time—nay, the duty—to be on hand as a decorative
object.”
181

59

While Smithsonian’s appearance is very important to her, she is not vain. She
likes to look put together and stylish. “In the ladies’ room, Lacey smoothed her skirt,
powdered her nose, reapplied her lipstick, and combed her hair. If she wound up on
camera by accident she might as well look good. She returned to the sidewalk outside the
courthouse.”
182

Smithsonian wants to resemble her 1940s movie sirens and has her brown hair
highlighted with golden blonde streaks. “Blonde is obviously more than just a hair color.
Blonde means youth; it means soft and pure; it means sexually attractive. Marjorie
Rosen claimed in her 1973 book, Popcorn Venus, that the transition from silent to sound
films transformed the blonde from ‘virginal heroine’ to ‘temptress.’”
183

Like the women of the 1940s, Smithsonian aspired to look like the screen sirens
of that era. “British researcher Jackie Stacey asked women to write to her about their
favorite stars of the 1940s and 1950s. She found that ‘copying’ was ‘the most common
form of identificatory practice’ among respondents ‘Perhaps this is not surprising,’
Stacey commented, ‘given the centrality of physical appearance to femininity in
general….and to female Hollywood stars in particular.’”
184

Smithsonian is very different from Betty Suarez, the main character of the
television show Ugly Betty. Unlike Smithsonian, Suarez does not hate fashion. Suarez
just isn’t stylish. “The Mode office is full of skinny blonde models, unlike Suarez, who is
an averaged-sized Latina with a lack of style who pays little attention to her appearance.
Being stylish and looking great are paramount at Mode and Suarez is often the butt of her
co-workers’ jokes.”
185

60

Suarez and Anderson both dress differently from their fashionable co-workers.
However, while Suarez simply doesn’t care what others think about her, Anderson begins
to feel more inadequate next to them. “Being stylish and looking great are paramount at
MODE and Suarez is often the butt of her co-worker’s jokes. For her first day of work at
MODE Suarez wears a poncho that her father got her as a souvenir from Guadalajara,
Mexico, and for Halloween her co-worker Marc St. James (Micheal Urie) dresses up as
Suarez in a similar poncho to mock her.”
186

Physically, the two women can’t be more different. Miller, a former model, has
little in common with the young ethnic reporter. Miller looks like Suarez’s co-workers.
“The MODE office is full of skinny blonde models, unlike Suarez, who is an average
sized Latina American with a lack of style who pays little attention to her appearance.”
187

Suarez has “large glasses, bushy eyebrows and braces”
188
while Miller is tall, blonde and
thin. When Suarez describes herself, she sees “a young, confident, intelligent, hard-
working woman”
189
not mentioning anything about her looks. Miller is not vain in any
sense, but she is aware of her good looks. She tries to play down her features but realizes
that she looks like a femme fatale no matter her outfit choice.
Miller did not attend college nor get an education in any sense in journalism while
Suarez takes her craft very seriously—it is not only her passion but her specialty. Suarez
graduated from “Mid-County College” and did two internships at magazines.
190
While
Suarez stands out among the other co-workers, Miller blends in. Miller doesn’t notice
any hostility unless it has to do with jealous co-workers who want her column. It is never
about looks at Gazelle because Miller looks the part.

61

Anderson had always dressed in pantsuits or jeans and a blouse. She didn’t think
twice about it, but once she started working in the fashion industry, she felt unattractive.
“She was almost at the door when it swung open and Rebecca was ushered in, coatless,
glamorous, utterly effortlessly intimidating. With no opportunity to smooth her hair or
belt her coat, Annie was instantly rendered a mess by Rebecca’s slim-line black Gucci
trouser suit and swingy shampoo-ad hair.”
191

Anderson is a stark contrast to Smithsonian. She doesn’t try very hard to look
fashionable. She knows what works and dresses professionally. Her tendency to wear
unflattering, masculine clothing stems from her rape. The night Planton raped her,
Anderson was wearing at tight-fitted dress, and since them, she prefers to wear clothes
that shield her from others, making her clothes an armor to protect her from harm. Her
and Roberts “use clothing protectively, covering themselves from inappropriate glances
and comments that take the focus away from their reporting and put it on their bodies.”
192

When Anderson lands in New York, she does her best to look the part but it
doesn’t come naturally. She always ends up looking sloppy.
So her new season’s wardrobe, the result of a bank-balance-busting trolley dash
around Selfridges, had remained crumpled in her trolley dolly suitcase, where it
had been for the best part of eighteen hours while Annie did a speed-of-light
change. Off came the black rollneck she’d worn to fly, on went a finer, cleaner
version. Annie just hoped her favorite Gina boots—spike-heeled, leopard-skin,
full-on sex kitten—would carry her jeans one more night. The very same boots
whose eye-catching leopard-skin print was now invisible under a sodden layer of
gray goo.
193

When Anderson sees her reflection in the mirror, she sees “pale skin and eyes rimmed in
gray from lack of sleep needed more than a simple touch-of-mascara-and-dash-of-lippy
repair job.”
194
Her discomfort with her looks is apparent when she is surrounded by high-

62

powered fashionistas and skinny models at her first fashion show. “Whipping off a
woolen beanie hat that broke every style law in the book. Annie stuffed it into her
enormous shoulder bag in the vain hope that no one would notice and scanned the crowd
in the Armory’s entrance hall, praying not to see anyone she knew. Not that anyone of
note knew her.”
195

She becomes more fashion conscious as the series progresses and starts wearing
some pieces from designer lines, like Helmut Lang and Christian Dior, although she
knows she still stands out because of her plainness. “This, decided Annie, must be what
hell was like, full of people who were infinitely thinner, richer, and more attractive than
you. People who looked like they slept, went to the gym, and had lives that were under
control.”
196
Her insecurities of her looks show the reader her sob sister tendencies.
When Anderson started at the The Post, her editor put her on a story that required
her to wear revealing clothing to get the scoop. Greenhouse, the editor, crosses the
ethical lines by making Anderson use her body.
“I remember Annie’s first day,” Ken started. “We thought we’d give her a girlie
job, see what she was made of, and sent her out in a skirt that looked more like a
belt, told her if she wanted to be an investigative journalist she could investigate a
few building sites. A few of you will remember that feature. And Annie, the
boys from the sports desk have asked me to give you this.”
It was a card, mocked up by one of the designers. A very much younger and
slightly plumper Annie stood next to scaffolding, a yellow hard hat crammed onto
unruly curls. She wore a child-sized Bob the Builder T-shirt so tight that even her
breasts looked large in it and steel-capped boots several sizes too large. Annie
was five feet four, not exactly stumpy, but next to a foreman—six feet plus and
sixteen stone—she looked tiny.
197

After the assignment, Anderson adopted a more masculine look, wearing work pants and
conservative tops, which “gives validity to the argument that women should embrace a

63

more masculine workplace wardrobe in order to garner respect and divert attention
toward intelligence rather than body parts.”
198

Similarly, Roberts dresses casually and doesn’t care what people think of her
jeans and blouses. When Robert’s new editor, Carol Fields, tells her there is a new dress
code where reporters have to look professional and wear high heels on the job, Roberts
tells her she will not. “I prefer to dress in clothes that will not impede my progress or
intimidate the daylights out of my sources.”
199

Miller also believes there shouldn’t be a regimented dress code at work. As a
model, she had no say in what she was wearing. She was sexualized and others used her
body to sell clothes. Now that she is a journalist, she is able to control how others
perceive her. She is the master of her appearance and she enjoys it. Instead of
conforming, she wears what she feels like, no matter how tacky it can look. “The T-shirt
was an acid green with a tasseled hem and the words ‘Bahama Mama’ stitched across the
front above a pink palm tree. In the worst kind of taste. Which is why she wore it. She
was sick of chic.”
200

When she wants to be taken seriously, Miller dresses in the power suits and heels.
Even though her normal look consists of T-shirts and jeans, Miller can dress the part of a
fashion writer if she feels like it. “She could wear to the memorial service what she’d
worn to the office—black turtleneck, black St.-Laurent suit of ancient vintage, black
stockings, black boots, and black trench coat.”
201
As a former runway model, Miller
understands the power of fashion, especially color. “Black was the simplest and least
expensive solution. It also expressed her outlook on life.”
202

64

Like Rebecca Brooks, the editor-in-chief of Gazelle, Forte prefers her journalists
to look the part and “insisted her staff to dress in style.”
203
Although she doesn’t care
about her wardrobe all the time, Miller has the look and the clothes to play the part. Her
closet has designer clothes in it, which are remnants of her former career and her previous
obsession with high-end clothing. Miller’s solution to her lack of designer accessories in
her personal closet is to raid the office closet, which is filled with samples from top
designers in the business. “She needed something to dress up her vintage St. Laurent,
black with braid trim. She chose an Art Deco pin for the lapel, a delicate gold chain,
small pearl earrings, and a cashmere scarf to drape over a shoulder.”
204

Smithsonian’s style is the only reason Mac gave her the fashion beat after the
former fashion editor, Mariah “The Pariah” Morgan died while working at her desk at
The Eye. Lacey was working on the city beat under the byline “L.B. Smithsonian” when
Mac chose her as the new fashion reporter. “Unfortunately for Lacey, she was the first
person in Mac’s line of vision. Like a baby chick that imprints on the first thing it sees,
Mac imprinted on Lacey. He didn’t see a hard working reporter breaking stories, a
woman cultivating sources, ferreting out the truth, and championing justice. Mac only
saw the only reporter at The Eye who dressed well, who could put two colors together
without nauseating passersby on the street.”
205
If she dressed more like Anderson or
Roberts, she wouldn’t have been chosen as the new fashion reporter.
Felicity Pickles, the food editor who wanted that job didn’t get it because she
dresses frumpily and is overweight. Smithsonian dislikes being stereotyped into the role
as the fashion journalist, but she still accepts the editor’s job offer. Also, Mac wanted to

65

put a picture of Smithsonian next to her column, which she wholeheartedly objected to.
Smithsonian wants to be taken seriously while her editor wants to use her looks to get
more readers and sell more papers.
Mac also told her she needed to change her original byline which was the non-
gender specific L.B. Smithsonian, to Lacey Smithsonian. “Sob sisters also underwent a
form of masculinization, adopting male-associated names.”
206

When Mac hears Smithsonian’s plea to keep her byline as her initials, he still tells
her no. “‘Not anymore.’ The editorial sneer was back. ‘You’ve got a fashion column to
write. For women. Besides, you do that ‘matching’ thing. You know, with your clothes.
You’re practically an expert.’”
207

Like Smithsonian, Miller likes to use makeup at work to look the part. “Lydia
had applied fresh lipstick and darkened her too blonde eyebrows, emphasizing the
winged one that gave her a snotty look—a good defense in dealing with snotty people
like Milke.”
208
In an industry where looks are everything, Miller fits in with the “in”
crowd. She only uses her looks at work and doesn’t pay too much attention to them out
of the office.
Sachs, on the other hand, blindly chooses her outfit for her job interview at the
high fashion magazine, Runway, with no care at all. “…She grudgingly decides to go in
for the interview, evident in the way she carelessly throws on mismatched clothes that
bordered on supremely ugly. She figured that outer appearances were not of any
importance in getting hired for a job. They’re not going to hire me or reject me on the
outfit alone, I remember thinking. Clearly, I was barely lucid.”
209

66

Anderson and Sachs want to be taken seriously, and to do so, they wear
professional attire. However, in the fashion world, being stylish means being taken
seriously. While newspaperwoman try to dress like a man to be more successful at their
workplace, fashion magazine writers strive to look stylish. Both women lack the fashion
sense of their co-workers at their respective magazines have and their lack of fashion, in a
sea of stylish reporters, makes them stand out. “The blonde nodded curtly and handed
back Annie’s passport, giving her a none-too-friendly once-over as she did so. One that
said, They let you work on Handbag?”
210

Both women must submit themselves to restrictive diets in order to conform to the
idealistic thin body in fashion. For Sachs, she knows she must lose weight to fit the
sample sizes and she gladly sheds the pounds. For Anderson, she must eat less and be
more like Brooks, which means she must eat very little to look more like a fashion writer.
Lou clues her in as to what the “fashion feeling” is, which is how the fashion
world describes hunger pangs. “Annie suppressed a shudder. Now she knew what Lou
had meant by “that fashion feeling.” Practically the last piece of advice Lou had given
Annie before she left the Post was that the plummeting sensation in Annie’s stomach
would become her constant companion throughout the shows. “You’ll get used to it,”
Lou had said. “Just remember, half of us feel precisely the same way. The other half
aren’t worth bothering about.”
211

The race to get skinny is a resounding theme in both magazine settings. The
women in the office all strive to look the part, and in turn, will do anything to get there.
Sach’s co-worker, Emily Charlton, is happy when she gets a compliment on her newly

67

skinny frame. She explains to Sachs about her new diet “where I don’t eat for a week
and when I think I’m going to faint, I eat a cube of cheese. I figure I’m one stomach-flu
away from my goal weight.”
212

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CHAPTER FIVE: LOVE AND OTHER DISASTERS

Ethics

Don’t be silly. I’ve offended my quota of sources for the day. I’d like to quit while I’m
ahead.
213

—Lacey Smithsonian

In Anderson’s first foray into fashion journalism she gets the mysterious and
press-shy Mailer to open up to her and he reluctantly lets her tag along for a private party
at a restaurant.
He invited me because he trusted me and Mark trusted me because that’s what I
do. Build trust. Like you said, I’m a good journalist. Plus he didn’t really have
much choice. I was under his feet for two days and when the makeup artist asked
Mark which bar it was at again, Mark had to invite me because I was there. The
man was just too polite for his own good. And he’s not that kind of guy, either.
214

Like her, Torchy Blane did whatever she could to get the story. Moral and ethical lines
blurred as she fought for the truth all in the name of the public’s right to know. “Torchy
didn’t hesitate to forage for news—to lie, cheat, steal, eavesdrop, impersonate, and break
and enter. If forced to justify her actions, she may city the public’s right to know.”
215

Similarly, the character of Sofia Reyes in Ugly Betty shares some similarities with
Anderson. While Reyes has the looks and fashion, Anderson does not. However, both
women decide unethical ways of getting a story. Anderson is aware of the journalistic
lines she crosses and has a hard time forgiving herself for her tactics, but Reyes does not
care. Reyes uses her looks to get her stories and “utilizes deceptive tactics to get the
story she wants, no matter who she hurts along the way.”
216

Even Anderson’s closest friend, McCartney doesn’t seem bothered by using sex
as a tool to get a story, which horrifies Anderson. Anderson cannot imagine going that

69

far for a story. When Anderson recounts the murder to her best friend, Lou is hesitant to
believe the story. Lou cannot believe that Anderson got the interview of the century
without sleeping with Mailer. Anderson can tell that although Lou says she believes her
version, secretly, Lou thinks Anderson had sex with him. “…Annie couldn’t even begin
to explain that she’d never have slept with Mark, because she only had sex with men who
didn’t matter. (And then only if lust and alcohol got the better of her.).”
217

While she worked for The Post, Anderson strived to be the best investigative
journalist she could be. She also ended up growing too attached to her subjects, clouding
her judgment. When things didn’t go properly, she couldn’t stop thinking about it. “‘I
mean, it’s obvious, isn’t it?’ Green was saying. ‘The woman’s got a Messiah complex.
It’s never just a story to her, oh no. She’s got to save everybody. I mean what’s with
that?’”
218

Her former co-workers didn’t know that her need to save people stems from her
rape. She was a helpless victim and no one came to save her. By working as an
investigative reporter, she can save people and not allow them to become victims of
senseless crimes. When Annie couldn’t save Irina, she is unable to forgive herself. To
her, it was her job to save victims and when she couldn’t, she felt like she couldn’t do her
job properly.
Reyes does not have the same guilty conscience as Anderson and thinks betrayal
is just part of the job. In order to get a story on Daniel Meade, she “misled and lied to
Daniel Meade to make him fall for her.”
219
To Reyes, the bigger the scandal, the bigger

70

the story. She happily uses deception to have a cover story that she knows will be a huge
success and therefore a moneymaker.
In the cutthroat world of journalism, Anderson knows her limit and what ethical
and moral lines she doesn’t want to cross. When she is speaking to Patty Lang, the
troubled model and widow of Mailer, she knows she must be Lang’s friend and turns off
her recorder. She acts like a psychiatrist to Lang and consoles her. Lang sought her out
to speak to her and treats Anderson like a close friend. “Patty’s face set, stubbornness
etched in every line. ‘Mark trusted her,’ she said. ‘So I trust her.’ Her tone said she
would tolerate no argument.”
220

Anderson feels bad because to her, Lang is a source but she doesn’t have the heart
to clarify their relationship when Lang spills her guts to her. ‘“There’s so much you
don’t know. You’re my only friend.” Patty gulped air between the sobs. “No one else
will listen.” Annie put down the coffee she’d ordered from room service. It had gone
cold anyway and now it tasted bitter. I’m not your friend, she wanted to say. I’m a
journalist.”
221

When she worked at The Post, Greenhouse had to remind her not to get close to
her sources. “Never allow yourself to get attached to a case study. That was one of the
many rules Ken Greenhouse had taught her. Rules Annie invariably broke. As he’d said
when she’d insisted on going to Irina’s funeral, ‘Trouble with you, Annie, you think
you’re their friend. You’re not. You’re not there to save anyone. You’re there to get the
story.’”
222

71

Mailer’s sister, Cathy, is suspicious of Anderson’s motives and believes the worst.
‘“Did you think he wouldn’t notice?’ the woman continued. ‘No questions about form,
inspiration, or influence, just family and background and his private life. But it was only
when Anya recognized you backstage that it sunk in. She’d already told Mark someone
had been asking after Patty on Monday night, so when she spotted you at Mark’s show
she told him you were a fake. You people, you don’t give a damn, do you? You’d do
anything for a story.’”
223

Love And Marriage

I’m not legally awake yet, so don’t start bitching please. I’ll call you back after I’ve had
coffee.
224

-Lydia Miller

The three journalists prefer to steer clear of relationships, but ultimately, end up in
serious relationships. When Smithsonian heads to Paris for a story, she and Donovan are
no longer together. Smithsonian loves him but he does not want to commit to her.
During the trip, she can’t stop thinking about Donovan and he shows up as she is being
pestered by Nigel Griffin, a jewel retriever. “Lacey drank in the sight of Victor Donovan.
From his curly dark brown hair to his well-worn boots, Donovan looked as broodingly
handsome as any French movie star, but he was one-hundred-percent American. And he
looked good to Lacey. Maybe too good.”
225
Donovan beats up Griffin and professes his
love for Smithsonian. From there, their relationship quickly escalates and they take the
next step which is steady throughout the books after Paris.
Anderson falls for Chris Mahoney, the director of international advertising for the
fashion company Fava, and Roberts falls in love with Joe Donelli, a New York detective.

72

“That messy fair hair, the gray-blue eyes that crinkled at the edges when he smiled, the
lanky body that could make even the best clothes look stylishly scruffy, cheekbones like
wing mirrors. Still gorgeous, still much more her type than Lou’s.”
226
Mahoney and
Donelli must work at getting the suspicious journalists to see that they don’t have bad
intentions. Roberts and Anderson try very hard to not like them, but in the end, cannot
help it. Like Smithsonian, Anderson needed to be saved by a man, Mahoney. Anderson
confessed her secret to him, that she had been raped as a teenager, and he shows her that
after 11 years, it is still not her fault. Mahoney is a positive influence in her life and
shows her that a relationship can be healthy.
Roberts falls for Donelli while Anderson goes against her own instincts begins to
have feelings for Mahoney. The self-proclaimed loners both find love. Roberts and
Donelli marry and adopt kids together, while Anderson moves in with Mahoney. The
journalists go against everything they stood for and find their significant other. Roberts is
able to find a new job at Inside Atlanta, a magazine covering all types of news. Her new
position is covering the crime beat and she loves it. Her love and work lives are both in
good places.
227

However, Anderson self-sabotages herself and readers are left just as uncertain as
Anderson on the status of her roller coaster relationship with Mahoney by the end of the
second novel in the series, Deadly Beautiful.
Editors

Bloody groupies. Anyone would think it was a rock concert, not a fashion
show.
228

—Annie Anderson

73

Mac is a grouchy and bossy editor on the outside, while caring on the inside.
When Lacey told him about a young homeless girl, Jasmine, who had witnessed a crime,
Mac insists on Smithsonian finding her and helping the girl. When Smithsonian presses
on, he tells her of his foster life. The grumpy editor reveals a tragic part of his past and as
a result, humanizes himself. Instead of just viewing him as an editor who is always
hollering about deadlines, she sees him as a human being. He is invested in the homeless
girl and eventually tells Smithsonian he wants to become a foster parent to the girl and
her sister. “‘I want to save them before they get thrown to the lions.’ He stood up and
stretched. ‘There are lions out there. Lions and tigers and bears. Never forget that.’”
229

In the end, the homeless girl and her sister are adopted by Mac and his wife, Kim. Every
time Smithsonian sees Mac with the girls, she sees a human being. She no longer refers
to him as a grouch because Smithsonian understands that is a façade. The tough editor is
a friend to her, and no longer an overbearing and unrelenting boss.
Mac is similar to Henry Connell, the managing editor of The New Bulletin in the
film Meet John Doe. Connell, “at first glance the typical Capra-Riskin-Swerling hard-
boiled editor who ends up being a softie at heart. But he is a far more complicated
character than most of the other editors in Capra’s films.”
230

Mac knows that the newspaper must make money, so when Smithsonian has the
exclusive on a murder, he jumps at the opportunity. “Mac liked the idea of the paper
breaking a murder story, if it was a murder story. He also found it amusing that the other
media were hotly pursuing a phantom named Angie.”
231

74

Connell, a loyal employee of the newspaper first, a good journalist second, knows
what most movie editors know—the health of the newspaper comes first. If the
newspaper dies, there is nothing left. Anything that threatens the newspaper—poor
sales, libel suits, the paper’s reputation—must be dealt with immediately, ethics be
damned.
232

Not only is Brooks treated like a celebrity, the rich and famous view her as an
icon. Anderson sees the hierarchy unfolding in front of her as she sees Brooks’s peers
covet anything she wears or does. Even someone Brooks dismisses or ignores is noted
by the fashionistas as reason enough to do the same.
Annie wasn’t the only one to be taken aback. Her surprise was echoed in
meaningful stares from those around them. Rebecca omitting to schmooze a
designer was serious, forgoing the backstage ritual unheard of…What was the
story? Because there had to be one. If Rebecca Brooks was passing up an
opportunity to consolidate next season’s advertising, then either something was
seriously wrong or Handbag’s editor had bigger fish to fry. Annie had a horrible
feeling she was about to be battered. A tug at her belt caused Annie to file the
thought away for further consideration.
233

Brooks is used to being in control and listened to. She didn’t get to her current job letting
people tell her what to do. Brooks is also keen on looking the part of a powerful editor-
in-chief and never looks anything but perfect. When Annie arrives late to her first day of
work at New York Fashion Week, Brooks scolds her for her tardiness.
She had a point, thought Annie; if Rebecca had been in Annie’s boots none of this
would have been permitted to happen. The plane would never have dared to be
late, the traffic on the Van Wych Expressway would have parted like the Red Sea,
and the concierge would have had her check-in complete before she’d finished
wafting through the hotel’s revolving doors. As for the taxi, any taxi driver stupid
enough to splash Rebecca Brooks’s bran-new Marc Jacobs trench and waiting-
list-only shoes would never live to tell the tale.
234

75

The stereotype of the cold-hearted editor pushing her writers to get the story is played out
in the novel. Brooks doesn’t care about the subjects as Anderson does but only about the
success of her magazine. Since she started the magazine herself, the success of it means
everything to her. While Brooks tries to control Anderson, she tries to maintain some
independence and keeps Brooks guessing, something her editor-in-chief does not
appreciate.
Brooks is also desperate to show her power in the fashion world and makes sure
she is seen with the top designers and people in the business.
Almost literally clinging to her boss’s coattails, Annie watched fascinated as
Rebecca worked the line without stopping. Unlike the preshow schmoozing there
was no halting to chat and air-kiss now. Rebecca was a woman on a mission, and
that mission did not involve making small talk with lower forms of fashion life; it
involved getting backstage fast and installing herself at the designer’s side before
anyone else.
235

The image of the fashionable editor-in-chief is more important to Brooks than the
journalistic integrity of her magazine.
God, she’s good, thought Annie, awestruck despite herself. She was used to
getting through the back door, chatting up receptionists, post boys, and
deliverymen. Social engineering, in the terms of the trade. This, however, was
something else entirely; this was sailing up the red carpet and watching the crowd
part and doors swing open at the merest hint of your presence. In less than a
minute they’d cleared the masses and passed through the white curtains separating
backstage from front.
236

She wants her magazine to be successful and by being seen as one of the most powerful
women in the fashion world, she can keep all eyes on the magazine and herself. “Now all
that lay between Rebecca and her target was a gaggle of models and the handful of
journalists, celebrities, and general hangers-on fortunate enough to be sitting a block or

76

two nearer the curtains, and they were no more than a minor irritant to the great Rebecca
Brooks.”
Anderson soon discovers that ice queen Brooks is actually a mother, something
she couldn’t believe, of someone so heartless. When Sachs sees Priestly without makeup
she is surprised. Not only that but Priestley confides in her that her husband left her and
plans on divorcing her. Both Sachs and Anderson cannot believe their tough editors
actually have vulnerabilities, something powerful women typically cannot have, lest they
be perceived as weaknesses.

77

CHAPTER SIX: NOT LIKE THE MOVIES

The film Killer Hair has the same plot as the novel, but several key elements are
missing. The most important thing in Smithsonian’s life is her Great Aunt Mimi’s trunk.
The trunk holds everything Smithsonian holds dear, but is not mentioned in the film.
While book explicitly describes Smithsonian’s vintage pantsuits and feminine
’40s-style skirts and blouses, the film shows Smithsonian in more modern looks, although
they still have a vintage feeling. She also almost always wears skirts or dresses, but not
pantsuits, in the film.
Maggie Lawson, who plays Smithsonian, looks exactly as the author describes
her—brown hair with blonde highlights, blue-green eyes.
Another key change is Smithsonian’s relationship with Vic Donovan. The books
describe the relationship as one kiss in Sagebrush without physical intimacy. The film
changes their history. In the film, Donovan and Smithsonian previously dated and were
intimate. “We dated for six months. I tried to erase Vic from my brain. He was a cop in
Sagebrush. I was covering crime, what little there was. Anyway, he was married. He
told me he was divorced, then I found out they were separated. He hadn’t even moved
out yet.”
237
While the book offers only has a kiss between the two on the last page, the
movie has them back together halfway through the film.
Donovan’s job is also different. While in the book, he is a former police chief and
current security consultant in the film he is Detective Vic Donovan in D.C., but a former
cop in Sagebrush. The author, Ellen Byerrum, said that fans of the book didn’t notice the
changed occupation. “I wondered about a lot of things in the film. I could tell every line I

78

hadn’t written. There was a lot of gasping on my part. When they made Vic a homicide
detective instead of a private investigator, thereby creating a huge conflict of interest for
Lacey, I was aghast.”
238

Another difference is that Pickles has white-blonde hair and is much thinner than
described. LeBlanc and Barton are also best friends in the film, while in the book they
hate each other. Also, Johnson, Wentworth, and Wiedmeyer are not mentioned at all in
the film.
Woods was a brunette in the film, while in the book she has blonde hair. Marcia
Robinson is not the owner of a videotape of naked parties with Washington’s most
powerful people but the madam of a prostitution ring.
The film tries to modernize Smithsonian’s look, and have a more romantic plot
than the book. When asked about the omission, Byerrum, thought it might be because of
the screenwriters wanting to put their stamp on the film. “I have no idea why Lifetime
cut Aunt Mimi’s trunk, particularly because the trunk is so important to Lacey and to all
the mysteries! I received more e-mails about Mimi’s missing trunk than any other issue in
the movies. People noticed. I have to say I agree. The trunk should have been included. It
is almost magical, and bottomless.”
239

The film retains Lacey’s sassy personality and Trujillo, Mac, Barton, and Stella
resemble their descriptions in the book. Lacey still despises the fashion beat.
Mac: “You know why I hired you, Smithsonian?”
Smithsonian: “Because just as I came in for an interview the fashion editor at this
very desk dropped dead after writing an article about shoulder pads.”
Mac: “Because you got style. I looked around the office and there you were, in an
old outfit.”
Smithsonian: “Vintage.”

79

Mac: “Right. That. And you’re damn good at writing pieces on it.”
Smithsonian: “You do remember that I went to journalism school. To write news.
Hard news. I’m good at it. I won awards.”
Mac: “And I’m sure they look swank above your mantle. But think about it this
way, you’re providing a public service.”
Smithsonian: “I am?”
Mac: Sure. “Lots of people read you. You know why? Because D.C.’s got
style.”
Smithsonian: “Except for the first lady.”
240

Smithsonian is also more focused on getting her stories on the front page. In the book,
she is ambitious and wants to get a story on the front page but the movie portrays her as
someone willing to do anything for a front-page story.
Smithsonian: “You already read it. And it’s going on the front page right?”
Mac: “Maybe you two should share the byline—combine stories.”
(Trujillo and Smithsonian bicker)
Mac: “Ok, Smithsonian it’s yours. Front page.”
241

(Smithsonian smiles smugly at Trujillo)
In the film, Smithsonian throws a rock into a home in order to enter it clearly crossing the
ethics line.
The second film, Hostile Makeover, is based on the third book in the series. The
trunk, which is present in every novel, is still absent in the film. Her purple trench coat is
a trademark ’40s look but the black nylons and long poufy skirt are not. The skirt
resembles a ’50s fashion while the nylons are the wrong color for that era. The look is
vintage but not the correct decade. Her clothes are just a mix of feminine pieces—
dresses, skirts. During the fashion show, Smithsonian’s dress has a pattern, like a
peacock pattern—that looks hippie-inspired.
In the film, Smithsonian’s first outfit with pants is loose-fitting black slacks,
topped with a rose-colored button-down blouse. The pants are 1940s—looking but the

80

top is not. As the film unfolds, Smithsonian’s style seems to improve. She wears a tight-
fitted knee-length skirt with a blouse and a nipped-in jacket.
Model Amanda Manville is shot while getting ready to do a photo shoot in the
novel but in the film, Manville is shot while doing a runway show in front of a large
audience.
In the book, Smithsonian doesn’t have a cell phone because she thinks it is
unnecessary. Mac eventually buys one for her as a work phone. In the film, she uses a
cell phone and doesn’t mention her distaste for them.
In the film, Donovan’s ex-wife, Montana Donovan, comes to town only to tell
Smithsonian that they are technically still married. Donovan lied to Smithsonian again as
he is still a married man.
Damon Newhouse from Deadfed.com is also portrayed as a friend of
Smithsonian’s, while in the book Smithsonian can’t stand him and his inaccurate articles.
In the last part of the film, Smithsonian confronts Manville’s killer at the
supermodel’s clothing headquarters. She is there with LeBlanc, her sister Cherise and
mother Rose. Caleb, the documentary filmmaker who was following Manville around
attacks her while her family is downstairs looking at the clothes on display. In the book,
Lacey going to photographer Hansen’s studio with Cherise and Rose. Lacey leaves her
family watching the video of Manville’s stint on reality television, while she goes looking
for clues. Lacey is cornered by the killer, Caleb, who begins filming her and confesses to
his crimes while trying to persuade her to shoot him.

81

CHAPTER SEVEN: CONCLUSION

Each woman has a different place in the world of fashion. Lacey Smithsonian is a
newspaperwoman who dreams of New York and the high fashion it entails and at the
same time, is frustrated by her title as a fashion writer. Annie Anderson, a successful
chief investigative journalist at a top paper, had a job Smithsonian dreams about. Unlike
Smithsonian, Annie Anderson wants to take a break and be in fashion—her field has
exhausted her emotionally and mentally. Anderson is plucked from her job and placed
on her first day at the front of the New York fashion shows and the opportunity to
schmooze with the fashion icons, something Smithsonian wishes she could do. Then
there’s Lydia Miller, who has had the insider’s view of fashion because of her successful
career as a top runway model. She’s seen it all and now uses journalism as her meal
ticket. Her lack of passion and exhaustion from being in the field forces her to quit her
job and get away from the fashion industry.
The three women are typical female journalists. Although they are at different
points in their career, their struggles with the stereotypes women face in the journalism
field is still evident, through analysis of the sob sisters and stunt reporters, and as victims.
They desire to work alone and not be in a relationship because of the importance of their
career or because of what a man has done to them in the past. Even though they don’t
want love, it always seems to find them. The men in their life always come in the nick of
time to save the journalists from the trouble they get themselves in.
Although the characters are fictional, their struggles with the stereotypes that
come with their career choice can reflect the struggles of the modern woman in the real

82

world. Fashion journalists are looked down upon and labeled as positions for sob sisters,
but women like Anderson strive to challenge the perceived notion that fashion writing is
not “real journalism.” She too is a sob sister, but in many ways, fights to not be labeled
so.
Clothes play a pivotal role in the fashion world—it is the core entity of the entire
industry. The way the women dress dictates how they are perceived by their peers and
sources. Since the early twentieth century, newspaperwomen have dressed more
masculine, in order to go head-to-head against their male co-workers and achieve
success.
Although Smithsonian, Anderson, and Miller are strong, independent and smart
women, they all fall under many stereotypes of female journalists that have plagued the
field since the beginning of the twentieth century.

83

ENDNOTES

1
Byerrum, Ellen, Designer Knockoff, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2004), 56.
2
Byerrum, Ellen, Killer Hair, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2003), 21.
3
Ibid. p. 7.
4
Ibid. p. 21.
5

Ibid. p. 48.

6

Ibid. p. 22.
7

Ibid. p. 17.
8

Ibid. p. 99.
9

Byerrum, Ellen, Grave Apparel, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2007), 5.
10

Ibid, p. 5.
11

Ibid. p. 5.
12

Byerrum, Ellen, Killer Hair, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2003), 11.
13

Ibid. p. 13.
14

Ibid. p. 13.
15

Ibid. p. 13.
16

Ibid. p. 13.
17

Ibid. p. 13.
18

Byerrum, Ellen, Grave Apparel, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2007), 9.
19

Byerrum, Ellen, Killer Hair, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2003), 13.
20

Byerrum, Ellen, Designer Knockoff, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2004), 13.
21

Ibid. p. 39.
22

Byerrum, Ellen, Killer Hair, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2003),17.

84

23

Ibid. p. 114.
24

Ibid. p. 114.
25

Ibid. p. 114.
26

Byerrum, Ellen, Designer Knockoff (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2004), 2.
27

Ibid. p. 3.
28

Byerrum, Ellen, Hostile Makeover, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2005), 2.
29

Ibid. p. 1.
30

Ibid. p. 2.
31

Ibid. p. 23.
32

Byerrum, Ellen, Grave Apparel, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2007), 3.
33

Ibid. p. 3.
34

Ibid. p. 23.
35

Ibid. p. 13.
36

Byerrum, Ellen, Designer Knockoff, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2004), 157.
37

Byerrum, Ellen, Grave Apparel, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2007), 21.
38

Ibid. p. 24.
39

Ibid. p. 24.
40

Ibid. p. 34.
41

Ibid. p. 34.

42

Ibid. p. 42.
43

Ibid. p. 43.
44

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballatine Books, New York, 2005), 203.

45

Ibid. p. 64.

85

46

Ibid. p. 9.
47

Ibid. p. 11.
48

Ibid. p. 12.

49

Ibid. p. 15.
50

Ibid. p. 5.
51

Ibid. p. 4.

52

Ibid. p. 4.

53

Ibid. p. 11.

54

Ibid. p. 19.

55

Ibid. p. 27.

56

Ibid. p. 27.

57

Hyde, Eleanor, In Murder We Trust, (Ballantine Books, New York, 1995), 28.

58

Ibid. p. 1.
59

Ibid. p. 1.

60

Ibid. p. 3.

61

Ibid. p. 2.

62

Ibid. p. 2.

63

Ibid. p. 2.

64

Ibid. p. 4.

65

Ibid. p. 65.

66

Ibid. p. 65.

67

Hyde, Eleanor, In Murder We Trust, (Ballantine Books, New York, 1995), 65.

68

Hyde, Eleanor, Animal Instincts, (Ballantine Books, New York, 1996), 7.

86

69

Byerrum, Ellen, Designer Knockoff, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2004), 144.
70

Saltzman, Joe, Sob Sisters: The Image of the Female Journalist in Popular Culture, (2003), 2.
71

Good, Howard, Girl Reporter: Gender, Journalism, and the Movies, (Scarecrow Press, Inc., Maryland,
1998), 7.

72

Ibid. p. 7.

73

Ibid. p. 50.

74

Saltzman, Joe, Sob Sisters: The Image of the Female Journalist in Popular Culture, (2003), 3.

75

Nieman, Danielle Ethlyne, The Lovesick Journalist: The Image of the Female Journalist In Danielle
Steel’s Novels, (University of Southern California, School of Journalism, 2010), 43.

76

Saltzman, Joe, Sob Sisters: The Image of the Female Journalist in Popular Culture, (2003), 54.

77

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballantine Books, New York, 2005), 13.

78

Saltzman, Joe, Sob Sisters: The Image of the Female Journalist in Popular Culture, (2003), 54.

79

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballantine Books, New York, 2005), 110.

80

Hwang, Priscilla, The Devil is in the Details: How the Devil Wears Prada Brands the Image of the
Fashion Journalist, (University of Southern California, School of Journalism), 2.

81

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballatine Books, New York, 2005), 94.

82

Ibid. p. 303.

83

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction of
Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, Schoolt of Journalism, 2009), 13.

84

Hyde, Eleanor, In Murder We Trust, (Ballantine Books, New York, 1995), 55.

85

Hyde, Eleanor, Animal Instincts, (Ballantine Books, New York, 1996), 13.

86

Byerrum, Ellen, Killer Hair, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2003), 180.

87

Saltzman, Joe, Sob Sisters: The Image of the Female Journalist in Popular Culture, (2003), 4.

88

Byerrum, Ellen, Killer Hair, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2003), 276.

87

89

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction of
Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, Schoolt of Journalism, 2009), 9.

90

Hyde, Eleanor, In Murder We Trust, (Ballatine Books Books, New York, 1995), 117.

91

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction of
Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, Schoolt of Journalism, 2009), 18.

92

Byerrum, Ellen, Grave Apparel, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2007), 38.

93

Ibid. p. 46.

94

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction of
Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, School of Journalism, 2009), 18.

95

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballatine Books, New York, 2005), 51.

96

Ibid. p. 55.

97

Ibid. p. 57.

98

Ibid. p. 61.

99

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction of
Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, Schoolt of Journalism, 2009), 19.

100

Ibid. p. 18.

101

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballatine Books, New York, 2005), 69.

102

Ibid. p. 31.

103

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction
of Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, School of Journalism, 2009),
18.

104

Hyde, Eleanor, In Murder We Trust, (Ballantine Books, New York, 1995), 13.

105

Ibid. p. 15.

106

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction
of Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, School of Journalism, 2009),
19.

107

Byerrum, Ellen, Armed and Glamorous, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2008), 319.

88

108

Hyde, Eleanor, In Murder We Trust, (Ballantine Books, New York, 1995), 63.

109

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction
of Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, School of Journalism, 2009),
19.

110

Hyde, Eleanor, In Murder We Trust, (Ballantine Books, New York, 1995), 63.

111

Ibid. p. 63.

112

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction
of Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, School of Journalism, 2009),
25.

113

Byerrum, Ellen, Armed and Glamorous, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2008), 267.
114

Saltzman, Joe, Sob Sisters: The Image of the Female Journalist in Popular Culture, (2003), 3.
115

Byerrum, Ellen, Grave Apparel, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2007), 283.
116

Byerrum, Ellen, Killer Hair, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2003), 205.
117

Ibid. p. 275.
118

Ibid. p. 274.
119

Ibid. p. 207.
120

Byerrum, Ellen, Hostile Makeover, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2005), 265.
121

Byerrum, Ellen, Raiders Of The Lost Corset, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2006), 93.
122

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction
of Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, School of Journalism, 2009),
27.

123

Ibid. p. 26.

124

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballatine Books, New York, 2005), 280.

125
Ibid. p. 37.

126

Ibid. p. 64.

89

127

Ibid. p. 239.

128

Baker, Sam, Deadly Beautiful, (Ballantine Books, 2008), 25.

129

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballatine Books, New York, 2005), 67.

130

Ibid. p. 68.

131

Hyde, Eleanor, In Murder We Trust, (Ballantine Books, New York, 1995), 95.

132

Ibid. p. 97.

133

Ibid. p. 97.

134

Ibid. p. 97.

135

Ibid. p. 97.

136

Ibid. p. 97.

137

Ibid. p. 98.

138

Ibid. p. 98.

139

Hyde, Eleanor, In Murder We Trust, (Ballantine Books, New York, 1995), 225.

140

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballatine Books, New York, 2005), 209.

141

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction
of Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, Annenberg School of
Communication and Journalism, 2009), 31.

142

Ibid. p. 31.

143

Nieman, Danielle Ethlyne, The Lovesick Journalist: The Image of the Female Journalist In Danielle
Steel’s Novels, (University of Southern California, Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism,
2010), 43.

144

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Random House, New York, 2005), 13.

145

Ibid. p. 64.

146

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction
of Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, Annenberg School of
Communication and Journalism, 2009), 8.

90

147

Byerrum, Ellen, Grave Apparel, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2007), 212.

148

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction
of Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, Annenberg School of
Communication and Journalism, 2009), 9.

149

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballatine Books, New York, 2005), 86.

150

Ibid. p. 273.

151

Hyde, Eleanor, In Murder We Trust, (Ballantine Books, New York, 1995), 9.

152

Ibid. p. 8.

153

Ibid. p. 8.

154

Ibid. p. 30.

155

Ibid. p. 9.

156

Ibid. p. 33.

157

Temples, Dawn, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly: How the Television Show Ugly Betty Depicts
Fashion Magazine Journalists, (University of Southern California, Annenberg School of Communication
and Journalism), 5.

158

Ibid. p. 5.

159

Hyde, Eleanor, In Murder We Trust, (Ballantine Books, New York, 1995), 83.

160

Ibid. p. 83.

161

Byerrum, Ellen, Killer Hair, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2003), 118.

162

Temples, Dawn, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly: How the Television Show Ugly Betty Depicts
Fashion Magazine Journalists, (University of Southern California,School of Journalism), 3.

163

Ibid. p. 3.

164

Byerrum, Ellen, Grave Apparel, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2007), 44.

165

Byerrum, Ellen, Killer Hair, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2003), 117.
166

Ibid. p. 118.

91

167

Ibid. p. 117.
168

Byerrum, Ellen, Grave Apparel, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2007), 225.
169

Byerrum, Ellen, Designer Knockoff, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2004), 129.
170

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction
of Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, Annenberg School of
Communication and Journalism, 2009), 40.

171

Ibid. p. 40.

172

Ibid. p. 43.

173

Born, Donna, The Image of the Woman Journalist in American Popular Fiction: 1890 to the Present,
(Central Michigan University, School of Journalism, 1981), 16.

174

Beasley, Maurine H. and Sheila J. Gibbons, Taking Their Place: A Documentary History of Women
and Journalism, (The American University Press, Washington, D.C., 1993), 13.

175

Saltzman, Joe, Sob Sisters: The Image of the Female Journalist in Popular Culture, (2003), 4.

176

Good, Howard, Girl Reporter: Gender, Journalism, and the Movies, (Scarecrow Press, Inc., Maryland,
1998), 68.

177

Byerrum, Ellen, Killer Hair, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2003), 209.

178

Saltzman, Joe, Sob Sisters: The Image of the Female Journalist in Popular Culture, (2003), 10.

179

Good, Howard, Girl Reporter: Gender, Journalism, and the Movies, (Scarecrow Press, Inc., Maryland,
1998), 7.

180

Ibid. p. 67.

181

Ibid. p. 67.

182

Byerrum, Ellen, Killer Hair, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2003), 113.

183

Good, Howard, Girl Reporter: Gender, Journalism, and the Movies, (Scarecrow Press, Inc., Maryland,
1998), 21.

184

Ibid. p. 22.

185

Temples, Dawn, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly: How the Television Show Ugly Betty Depicts
Fashion Magazine Journalists, (University of Southern California, School of Journalism), 2.

92

186

Ibid. p. 2.

187

Ibid. p. 2.

188

Ibid. p. 3.

189

Ibid. p. 2.

190

Ibid. p. 3.

191

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballatine Books, New York, 2005), 102.

192

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction
of Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, Annenberg School of
Communication and Journalism, 2009), 43.

193

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballatine Books, New York, 2005), 17.

194

Ibid. p. 6.

195

Ibid. p. 16.

196

Ibid. p. 102.

197

Hyde, Eleanor, In Murder We Trust, (Ballantine Books, New York, 1995), 9.

198

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction
of Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, Annenberg School of
Communication and Journalism, 2009), 41.

199

Ibid. p. 42.

200

Hyde, Eleanor, In Murder We Trust, (Ballantine Books, New York, 1995), 1.
201
Ibid. p. 17.
202

Ibid. p. 17.
203

Ibid. p. 17.

204

Ibid. p. 66.

205

Byerrum, Ellen, Killer Hair, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2003), 98.

93

206

Saltzman, Joe, Sob Sisters: The Image of the Female Journalist in Popular Culture, (2003), 4.
207

Byerrum, Ellen, Killer Hair, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2003), 99.
208

Hyde, Eleanor, Animal Instincts, (Ballantine Books, New York, 1996), 11.

209

Hwang, Priscilla, The Devil is in the Details: How the Devil Wears Prada Brands the Image of the
Fashion Journalist, (University of Southern California, School of Journalism), 3.

210

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballantine Books, New York, 2005), 16.

211

Ibid. p. 17.

212

Hwang, Priscilla, The Devil is in the Details: How the Devil Wears Prada Brands the Image of the
Fashion Journalist, (University of Southern California, School of Journalism), 14.

213

Byerrum, Ellen, Designer Knockoff, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2004), 93.

214
Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballatine Books, New York, 2005), 95.

215

Good, Howard, Girl Reporter: Gender, Journalism, and the Movies, (Scarecrow Press, Inc., Maryland,
1998), 43.

216

Temples, Dawn, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly: How the Television Show Ugly Betty Depicts
Fashion Magazine Journalists, (University of Southern California, School of Journalism), 21.

217

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballatine Books, New York, 2005), 95.

218

Ibid. p. 13.

219

Temples, Dawn, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly: How the Television Show Ugly Betty Depicts
Fashion Magazine Journalists, (University of Southern California, School of Journalism), 21.

220

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballatine Books, New York, 2005), 140.

221

Ibid. p. 158.

222

Ibid. p. 159.

223

Ibid. p. 133.

224

Hyde, Eleanor, In Murder We Trust, (Ballantine Books, New York, 1995), 109.

225

Byerrum, Ellen, Raiders Of The Lost Corset, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2006), 140.

94

226

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballatine Books, New York, 2005), 232.

227

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist in the Fiction
of Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, (University of Southern California, School of Journalism, 2009), 9.
228

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballatine Books, New York, 2005), 15.

229

Byerrum, Ellen, Grave Apparel, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2007), 42.

230

Saltzman, Joe, Frank Capra and the Image of the Journalist in American Film, (The University of
California, Los Angeles, CA, 2002) 97.

231

Byerrum, Ellen, Killer Hair, (Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2003), 117.

232

Saltzman, Joe, Frank Capra and the Image of the Journalist in American Film, (The University of
California, Los Angeles, CA, 2002), 98.

233

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, (Ballantine Books, New York, 2005), 113.

234

Ibid. p. 19.

235

Ibid. p. 27.

236

Ibid. p. 27.

237

Killer Hair, 2009, Lifetime Movie Network.
238

Byerrum, Ellen, Interview, Sarah Sotoodeh, (April 2011).

239

Ibid.
240
Killer Hair, 2009, Lifetime Movie Network.
241

Ibid.

95

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Baker, Sam, Deadly Beautiful, Ballantine Books, 2008.

Baker, Sam, Fashion Victim, Ballatine Books, New York, 2005.

Beasley, Maurine H. and Sheila J. Gibbons, Taking Their Place: A Documentary History
of women and Journalism, The American University Press, Washington, D.C., 1993.

Born, Donna, The Image of the Woman Journalist in American Popular Fiction: 1890 to
the Present, Central Michigan University, School of Journalism, 1981.

Byerrum, Ellen, Killer Hair, Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2003.

Byerrum, Ellen, Designer Knockoff, Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2004.

Byerrum, Ellen, Hostile Makeover, Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2005.

Byerrum, Ellen, Raiders of the Lost Corset, Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2006.

Byerrum, Ellen, Grave Apparel, Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2007.

Byerrum, Ellen, Armed and Glamorous, Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2008.

Byerrum, Ellen, Shot Through Velvet, Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2007.

Good, Howard, Girl Reporter: Gender, Journalism, and the Movies, Scarecrow Press,
Inc., Maryland, 1998.

Hostile Makeover, 2009, Lifetime Movie Network.

Hwang, Priscilla, The Devil Is in the Details: How the Devil Wears Prada Brands the
Image of the Fashion Journalist, University of Southern California, Annenberg School
for Communication and Journalism.

Hyde, Eleanor, Animal Instincts, Ballantine Books, New York, 1996.

Hyde, Eleanor, In Murder We Trust, Ballantine Books, New York, 1995.

Killer Hair, 2009, Lifetime Movie Network.

96

Nieman, Danielle Ethlyne, The Lovesick Journalist: The Image of the Female Journalist
In Danielle Steel’s Novels, University of Southern California, Annenberg School of
Communication and Journalism, 2010.

Rossie, Amanda Marie, Beauty, Brains, and Bylines: Comparing The Female Journalist
in the Fiction of Sheryl Woods and Sarah Shankman, University of Southern California,
Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism, 2009.

Saltzman, Joe, Frank Capra and the Image of the Journalist in American Film, The
University of California, Los Angeles, CA, 2002.

Saltzman, Joe, Sob Sisters: The Image of the Female Journalist in Popular Culture,
(2003).

Temples, Dawn, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly: How the Television Show Ugly Betty
Depicts Fashion Magazine Journalists, University of Southern California, Annenberg
School of Communication and Journalism.

97

APPENDIX: NOVEL SUMMARIES

Killer Hair (2003) By Ellen Byerrum
Lacey Smithsonian, a fashion reporter for The Eye Street Observer in
Washington, D.C., looks into the murder of hairstylist Angie. Her best friend and
hairstylist, Stella LeBlanc, enlists her help after the police call Angie’s death a suicide
and close the case. Lacey uses fashion clues to investigate the story and must solve the
crime before she becomes the next victim.

Designer Knockoff (2004) By Ellen Byerrum
Lacey investigates the House of Bentley fashion, a fashion line that is back in the
news with their namesake fashion museum’s grand opening. Lacey must solve the
murder of a Bentley intern, which is somehow connected to the disappearance of a
woman, Gloria Adams, sixty years ago.

Hostile Makeover (2005) By Ellen Byerrum
Model Amanda Manville, a former contestant on an extreme makeover reality
show, is murdered. Manville’s makeover made her beautiful but also made her into a
monster. Her new fashion line is coming out and Lacey was set to cover her first show
but instead, witnesses her murder. Lacey uses her journalistic skills to solve the murder
of the supermodel and find out who blackmailed and killed Manville.

Raiders of the Lost Corset (2006) By Ellen Byerrum
Lacey takes her sleuthing skills to France and must solve the poisoning of a
friend, corset designer, Magda Rousseau, and find her missing jewels. Lacey goes with
Brooke, her best friend and is being followed by a mysterious ex-KGB spy and a British
jewelry retriever. The clues left by Madga and her grandfather take Lacey from France to
New Orleans, Louisiana.

Grave Apparel (2007) By Ellen Byerrum
Lacey has to solve an attack on a co-worker, editorial writer Cassandra
Wentworth. The trouble started when Cassandra wrote a scathing condemnation about
Christmas sweaters and Lacey got the blame for the mean-spirited attack on Christmas
sweaters and holiday cheer. Lacey must find the attacker and is assigned the job of
clearing the name of Felicity Pickles and Harlan Wiedemeyer. The only witness to the
assault is a little homeless girl who runs off whenever Lacey gets too close.

Armed and Glamorous (2008) By Ellen Byerrum
Lacey finds herself at the forefront of another murder, this time at the first class of
her private investigation course. Lacey wants to take the class in order to try and get out
of the fashion beat. The victim is heiress Cecily Ashton, who was profiled by Lacey days

98

before her murder. Her missing Louis Vuitton jewelry case, once owned by actress Rita
Hayworth, is the key to finding out who killed the heiress.

Shot Through Velvet (2011) By Ellen Byerrum
Lacey must solve the murder of Rod Gibbs, part owner of a recently shut down
velvet factory. Smithsonian finds Gibbs completely blue and strung up by blue velvet.
Lacey tries to find out who the killer is before she becomes the next target.

Killer Hair (2009)
A Lifetime Movie Network original movie. Maggie Lawson plays Lacey
Smithsonian, James McDaniel plays Mac, Mark Consuelos plays Tony Trujillo, Jocelyne
Loewen plays Felicity Pickles.

Hostile Makeover (2009)
A Lifetime Movie Network original movie. Maggie Lawson plays Lacey
Smithsonian, James McDaniel plays Mac, Mark Consuelos plays Tony Trujillo, and
Jocelyne Loewen plays Felicity Pickles.

Fashion Victim (2005) By Sam Baker
Annie Anderson, former chief investigative reporter for The London Post, must
navigate a new job as the fashion features editor for Handbag magazine while trying to
figure out who killed up-and-coming fashion designer Mark Mailer, before she becomes
the next victim.

Deadly Beautiful (2008) By Sam Baker
Anderson is asked by her best friend and former coworker, Lou McCartney, to
travel to Toyko, Japan and find her missing sister, Scarlet Ulrich. Ulrich went to Japan
for a modeling job and went missing. Anderson must find out what happened to her and
find out if she has been a victim of a serial murderer in Toyko who is targeting western
models.

In Murder We Trust (1995) By Eleanor Hyde
Lydia Miller, a former runway model, finds herself a suspect in the murder of
Adam Auerbach, one of her closest friends. The fashion writer must figure out the truth
and clear her name and find out who really killed her friend.

Animal Instincts (1996) By Eleanor Hyde
Tired of the fashion industry, Miller decides to quit her job as a fashion writer for
Gazelle magazine and work at a local animal shelter. While working there, she finds
suspicious documents that link the shelter with the newest fashion craze, a serum called

99

Anima that makes people look younger. Miller must protect the animals and see what is
really going on at the shelter and why there is a link between them and the serum.

Abstract (if available)

Abstract This work examines the image of female fashion journalists in three series of novels by Ellen Byerrum, Sam Baker, and Eleanor Hyde. Lacey Smithsonian is the main character in the “Crimes of Fashion” seven-novel series by Ellen Byerrum and two films, Killer Hair and Hostile Makeover, based on two of the novels. The two films will be compared and contrasted to the novels that inspired the films. Smithsonian will be compared to female journalists and fashion journalists, including Annie Anderson from the Sam Baker two-novel series and Lydia Miller, an ex-runway model turned fashion writer in the Eleanor Hyde two-novel series. ❧ Lacey Smithsonian hates being the fashion reporter, even though it brings her fame and success at the paper. Even though Lacey loves to dress in clothes from the 1940s, she dislikes being forced to write about fashion instead a “serious” beat. Lacey is a strong-willed female, but her role as a sob sister and victim is evident in the series. Crimes of fashion occur on her beat and, as she investigates, she ends up becoming part of the story. ❧ Annie Anderson must fight her inner demons as she acclimates to the new direction her career has taken as the fashion features editor for one of the top British fashion magazines, Handbag. Her previous job was at The London Post as the chief investigative reporter. She decided she needed a break from “serious” journalism and thus began her job in fashion. She does not fit in with the magazine, yet she is very successful and ends up landing coveted exclusive interviews that land her cover stories. Her investigative skills get her in trouble as she becomes involved in solving disappearances and murders that soon threaten her life. ❧ Lydia Miller is a former runway model who doesn’t share the same passion for journalism as Smithsonian and Anderson. The writer doesn’t care for the craft but only works for the fashion magazine Gazelle to pay the bills. She, too, stumbles onto murders and must solve the cases before she becomes history.

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Asset Metadata

Creator Sotoodeh, Sarah Christie (author)

Core Title Fashion transgressions and crimes of style: the image of the female fashion journalist

School Annenberg School for Communication

Degree Master of Arts

Degree Program Journalism (Broadcast Journalism)

Publication Date 04/27/2012

Defense Date 05/01/2012

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag Fashion,Female,journalist,OAI-PMH Harvest

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Saltzman, Joseph (committee chair), Birman, Daniel H. (committee member), Page, Tim (committee member)

Creator Email sarahsotoodeh@gmail.com,sotoodeh@usc.edu

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c3-15645

Unique identifier UC11288365

Identifier usctheses-c3-15645 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier etd-SotoodehSa-672.pdf

Dmrecord 15645

Document Type Thesis

Rights Sotoodeh, Sarah Christie

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the a...

Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

Repository Location USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus MC 2810, 3434 South Grand Avenue, 2nd Floor, Los Angeles, California 90089-2810, USA