Rating: 
Summary: Have you seen Sex and the City?
Review: If you've seen Sex in the City and you love it....as I do... you will love this book. Of course the characters are shallow, materialistic and not the brightest bulbs on the tree. IT'S A BOOK! It's supposed to be entertaining just like TV. I loved the book. I love the show. It's hysterical, light hearted and witty. For those who are looking for an educational, inspiring, and depressing book, go read the biography on JFK. Stay away from the fun books.
Rating: 
Summary: Don't waste your money
Review: This is one of the worst books I've ever read.The characters are boring, shallow and just plain ugly. The writing is one-note and the reader is left wondering why the author thought anyone would care about such a pathetic cast of characters who mouth hokey dialogue in storylines that are completely static. One has to wonder if someone just threw a pile of cash at Bushnell and told her to write another Sex and the City. Unfortunately, the result is completely charmless. Evidently, someone thought the success of the HBO series and the Bushnell name would be enough to sell this drivel. Even the plots seem dated--the cocaine snorting, the relentless pursuit of the Hamptons lifestyle, the cartoonish studio execs and rich men who use and abuse women. It's hard to tell whether Bushnell isn't much of a writer, or just has nothing worthwhile to say. Frankly, you'd do better to register for a class at Gotham Writers Workshop and read the weekly offerings of the beginners' short story class. You'd be more likely to read something of value there.
Rating:
Summary: Exuberant mixture of treasure and trash
Review: Candace Bushnell's previous Sex and the City, and the resulting HBO series, propelled her into the public eye. In Four Blondes, she tries to expand her repertoire, while sticking to the motifs that made Sex and the City so popular. The format is simple-- four novellas, each about a woman drifting among New York's moneyed classes, each striving unashamedly to the gratification of a basic desire (the list runs to love, lust, financial comfort and a sense of self). The works are heavily plotted (Wodehouse-ian, musical comedy plotted), and read like a cross between the early 20th C. late realist novelists (a bit too much has been made of the Edith Wharton connection, though both chronicle manners in upscale NY), 60s trash fiction like Jacqueline Susann or Harold Robbins, and the sense of illustration by amusing caricature of Armistead Maupin. Each female lead character seems like an Ellen Gilchrist passionate heroine grasping for fulfillment. But all the literarey references are really a bit beside the point (indeed, one of the amusing ways in which Ms. Bushnell shows her own self-awareness is by having her own characters reflect on their reflection in two other "similarities"--the works of Bret Easton Ellis and the movie "All About Eve"). I do not typically enjoy the "god isn't my social clique interesting" form of semi-autobio fiction. Heaven knows that some of the particularly dreary assumptions about life without huge sums of money seem to be not only afflictions of the characters, but also of the author, which would ordinarily turn me off. One can't help but miss in this book of virtues a few of the middle class virtues not displayed in great profusion by the folks portrayed here--humility and altruism come to mind. But it's undeniable that Ms. Bushnell has worked her particular form of genre fiction into something that transcends the Valley of the Dolls influences that permeate her work. Is this great literature? Absolutely not. Is this an entertainment? Absolutely. This is not uproariously funny, though it has some witty bits. Instead, this is a fluid read about odd people who, on reflection, may not be as odd as one initially thought. I read an interview with Ms. Bushnell in which she termed "pathetic" a reviewer who had dared to term these women protagonists "pathetic". But, really, it appears to me that Ms. Bushnell shows not only the exuberance but also the thread of pathos in us all, and that's something the 60s trash novelists did not accomplish nearly so well. This is a worthwhile read.
Rating: 
Summary: utterly boring and tasteless
Review: I watched sex and the city and fell in love with it. However, four blondes was a disappointment. I read two of the short stories and found it a waste of time. With the support of glamourous stars and clothings, it may be good TV materials. Without, it is utterly boring and tasteless.
Rating:
Summary: Great Summer Reading!
Review: This book is divided into 4 short stories about 4 women living lives that most people only read about in the tabloids. It definitely kept my interest and I finished the whole book while on vacation. Since the book is divided into 4 short stories, one each about each woman, it's the kind of book you can put down for a week and pick up again and know exactly where you left off.
Rating: 
Summary: Be Careful What You Wish For . . . You May Get It!
Review: 4 Blondes is three novellas and a short story about the beautiful and aspiring women in New York City. The cast of characters also include those who admire, lust for, marry, and earn a living from these blonde goddesses. Each of the four women has defined herself in terms of social position, physical goods, appearance, and how others relate to her. They each lack a core of who they are, as defined by their own inherent natures. In these stories, the women get what they think they want . . . and are disappointed in many ways. Life really begins when they move beyond their initial illusions to create a more appropriate direction for themselves. Many will find a peek into the minds and boudoirs of these women appealing, but few will find them sympathetic. It is that lack of sympathy that makes the book far less appealing than its potential to please the reader. The book's subject is graphically portrayed by the large image of Ms. Bushnell on the back of the dust cover. Seeing her and her credentials, you immediately know that she is writing about the real people she meets in her social activities and writing work. A number of my friends have inhabited this world at various times. Although the satire may seem broad, it isn't as broad as it would first appear. I remember being told about a well-known woman reporter who would not go out on a date until she had seen a balance sheet for the man in question that proved that his net worth was at least five million dollars. New York has long been the capital of attention for those who aspire to be rich, famous, thin, and admired. This book needs to be compared to Tom Wolfe's Bonfire of the Vanities, because it is the female version of that same subject. Of the stories in the book, I enjoyed Nice N'Easy by far the most. Janey Wilcox comes closest to being a whole person among the four heroines in the book. She is trying to find what she wants, and is a little confused about the best way to get things. But she persists, and emerges to a new plateau of maturity and effectiveness. If the whole book had captured that level of character progression, I would have rated it at four stars. Single Process is a short story that had great potential, but left it unrealized. Ms. Bushnell has focused primarily on making jokes about English men, and creating a fairy tale. As far as she goes, the story works. To have worked better, she should have steered a little closer to reality and defined London as something more than anti-New York. Platinum is simply a joke about being a real princess. This novella would have worked much better with a lot of editing down of the story. In all four stories, Ms. Bushnell gives you lots of details about various psychological disorders, drug addiction, unpleasant sexual practices, and various forms of humiliation. She would have done better to focus on fewer dysfunctions and portrayed them better. The way these are written, the reader is assumed to have had first-hand experience with most of these practices. Such a reader would be unusual in my experience outside of the social circles being described here. For those who don't like to read about extreme forms of depravity, skip this book. On the other hand, her prose is well crafted and moves the stories along smoothly. She knows her subject. So if you think of this book as a longer version of tabloid writing, you will like it very much. I suspect that those who will like 4 Blondes best are readers who will take the fictional characters and ascribe them to a real celebrity, and feel excited about knowing the inside scoop on these people. After you finish reading these stories, I suggest that you step back a bit and look at yourself in the mirror. Who do you see? Does it matter who you see? How does it make you feel to see yourself? Then change your perspective, and think about what the mirror would show if it reflected your inner self. Draw a picture of that new image. Keep it in mind! Pursue worthy goals in worthy ways!
Rating:
Summary: Just all-around bad
Review: This is the worst book I've run across in years -- boring, pointless, and flat. Someone else said the characters are unlikable, and they are, but they're also hopelessly dull. Bushnell intersperses passages of the most sophomoric dialogue imaginable with sudden descriptions of unconventional sex acts, perhaps in a vain attempt to wake the reader up. At the end of the second story -- Winnie and her husband -- I wanted to throw the thing against the wall in frustration. I settled for throwing it in the trash.
I didn't even pay for "Four Blondes" -- it came bundled with some magazine or other. But I think someone should pay _me_ for the hours I wasted thinking it couldn't stay this bad, that it was going to get better. Pheh. Don't waste your time.
Rating:
Summary: Return to sender
Review: Lame, lame, lame! I couldn't wait to give this book away after struggling with the third and fourth stories for several days and virtually throwing the book at the wall in frustration at such drivel. I really enjoyed the first story of Janey and her search for happiness in the Hamptons (Nice N'Easy), but things went downhill from there. The second story featured an extremely unlikeable harridan, Winnie, and Candace has literally lost the plot with the third and fourth stories. I found these two so irritating and unreadable that I would recommend anyone thinking about getting this book to stop reading it after the second story! She's nasty about English men, which really got my goat (what about Madonna and Guy huh!)so for that alone, she gets a big fat raspberry.
Rating:
Summary: A Vapid Version of Sex and the City
Review: After enjoying SEX AND THE CITY, I bought this book, Bushnell's second, on hardback. I was disappointed. The women of FOUR BLONDES are shallow, superficial and vapid, even more so than the models that litter SATC.
Rating:
Summary: Four Blondes
Review: The book is split into 4 different stories revolving around 4 different (blonde) characters. The first story is pretty good. So I quickly moved onto the next blonde. Not as good as the first. It seemed to drag. And the longer it dragged, the less sympathy (and at times, interest) I had for the characters. The third one made me continually question why I was reading the book. I kept going because I was sure that something major was about to be revealed to make the reader understand the characters actions. Never happened. I feared my face would retain the bewildered expression that it had taken on during the third story. The final story was the worst. It was boring, pointless and ended very abruptly to be immediately followed by me hurling the book across the room.
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