Things You Need to Be Told

Rating:
Summary: Things we don't need to be told by snotty little grrls.
Review: When did we determine being a snotty prep school grad made you an ettiquite guru? Deluded much?
haleth- I hate to tell you but knowing the "grrls" personally I have to inform you that they are not "characters", they portray themselves as they would like to be seen- which is better than everyone else.
Real class is making those around you feel special no matter what their background, ethnicity, upbringing, education, or outfit.

Their tone and "quirky" little nuances like RANDOM CAPITALIZATION are old because they have already been DONE. Cynthia Rowley & Ilene Rosenzweig?
Time to get a new gig grrls.

Rating:
Summary: Great Book!
Review: If you are in the 20 something age generation (or younger), this book is not only ,funny but oh so true. While reading the book I discovered many of my own faux pas, due to being lazy. We must all unite in better etiquette. Thank you Etiquette Grrls for leading the ban wagon!

Rating:
Summary: GRRLS?
Review: I haven't read the book because I found the site, which brought me to Amazon and the reviews prompted me to read the information again.If what I read is an indication of the book then No Thanks.Grrl,what the F--- is that,why do I need to know French, it's rude to speak or in this case write in a different language if you don't know the other person can it's polite to ASK FIRST,if you're going to speak or write in a language it's common sense to keep to one language or at least have translations and a warning sticker that this book contains french, write a French version GRRLS for people that actually know French that would be practicing etiquette and is also considerate,The Etiquette GRRLS and Dear Reader are written thousands of times,repetition,avoid it,especially when referring to yourself,it's irritating,selfish and not smart,refer to yourself as a third person what is up with that,why do words in the middle of a sentence start with Capital Letters, Proper Nouns start with capitals and last time I checked GRRLS was not a proper noun it ain't even a proper word. When I get through the garbage,a minimal amount of what I read and understand(because Francais Capito pochito)is actually useful (hence the one star rating). They could use lots of etiquette themselves, Especially in the Writing Department. Most of their advice was what THEY thought was etiquette their own personal opinion and very little of what IS etiquette. On the other hand the intention of this book could have been to make fun of etiquette, that it is what you want it to be as they so obviously display here, maybe it's meant to be a joke,and not to be taken seriously,although some might. Thanks for the website I just saved myself [$$], and that's great etiquette. 'We hope that the year 2000 will be as tasteful, well mannered, and intellectually stimulating as we ourselves have always been. Cheers!' They may think so highly of themselves but all this proves is you don't need to know much about etiquette to be an authority.

Rating:
Summary: things you need to be told in order to be...pretentious
Review: While some passages in this book appealed to me, I did find their style of writing and their opinion to be nothing but pretentious.
I was myself raised in Paris till my late teens, and have travelled quite a deal around the world and mastered several languages, including Latin and Classical Greek. However, I consider it outmost pretention and rudeness to drop in foreign words in my English conversation in order to sound "sophisticated".
Also, what is up with all the capitalized words? Improper use of grammar is tacky.
As far as choosing which cocktail, I consider it ridiculous to judge who you are by what your taste buds crave for at the moment. There are times that I enjoy a blue Hawaiian, and others when I could get by with a French 75. It all depends on MY mood, not some other person's opinion.
Real sophistication and class is within. People who look for material things to seek validation are extremely insecure, and that is the outmost lack of style.

Rating:
Summary: This is so money!
Review: Not to be Rude and Terribly Tacky, but Smoking Indoors (except By Yourself in Your Own Home or with Only Other Smokers in an area in which there are NO non-smokers, Period) as permitted in this otherwise Tolerable Tome of Weisenheimer Etiquette is not merely THOR, but Boorish, Inconsiderate, and, according to the Surgeon General, Unhealthy. And Excuse Me! for saying so.

Furthermore it is Bad Form, Poor Style and Terribly UnEnlightened to Actually Admit one drinks Gin and Tonics as Lesley and Honore do. Quelle horror! Does one know that gin is forty-some percent alcohol, an unnatural distilled spirit, and as aesthetically correct as day-glow hot pants? One might as well admit to Having Alcoholic Parents or to Lusting After a Cadillac SUV.

That aside, this petite bourgeois, New England-school, preppie frolic through Dear Abby land ain't half bad, and there are some genteel chuckles to be had if you allow yourself to just go with the flow and not think about The Fact that the authoresses aren't the Sort of People who will be inviting YOU to dinner. (All reviewers with the name "A Reader from ..." please raise your hand!)

So lighten up, Dear Reader. This is Humor, or at least it's The Old College Try. So kick off your Doc Martens, Toss Back A Few and enjoy the Too Clever By Half nervy scurvy advice from The Bee's Knees of Etiquette Please.

Which is what I did until...well, I know this is strictly Too Much Information (I'm wearing a full-out Jack Nicholson grin from The Shining (1980) as I write this), but since my erotic fantasies often involve Blue-Blooded, moneyed, Eastern Seaboard girls Old Enough To Know Better, it was Too Tacky For Words (not to mention a HUGE Disappointment) to see an actual, apparently un-retouched photo of the Etiquette Grrls on the back cover. Nearly Goth, and One Sees Why they had enough Time On Their Hands (p. 196) to watch EVERY Episode of Beverly Hills 90210!

Needless to say, this Visual Revelation caused me to drop My Poor Boy Reverie and allow hard-core Ennui, A Light Malaise, and a Horrowshow Disappointment to pass over me as I went 23-Skiddoo into the Artichoke Dip.

Rating:
Summary: You won't learn much here, except how to be like them
Review: "Things You Need To Be Told" by the Etiquette Grrls, Honore McDonough Ervin and Lesley Carlin is not really, when you get down to it, an etiquette book at all. It's more a book of how to behave, think and shop like Honore and Lesley, two obviously very privileged New England women, who come off many times like snobs. Whilst their style of Random Capitalization and Franglais can be funny at times, the overall impression is that etiquette is a way of distinguishing the "well-bred" from the Great Unwashed. I was under the impression that etiquette is useful because it is rooted in mutual respect, not snobbishness. I find the EGs to be very snobby, indeed.

There are some interesting things in the book, and some good etiquette tips are here to be gleaned, but you have to get through the sections on why you should wear a particular brand of nail polish (Urban Decay), what kind of writing paper you should use(never say stationery for some reason, and it should be Crane's) and what kind of neighborhood bar you should frequent (huh?). I found the most offensive part of the volume to be the EGs' Patois (a glossary) in the back, which seemed to nail down their particular prejudices and personal beliefs of their own superiority.

I think I'll stick to Miss Manners, Judith Martin, from now on. Ms. Martin seems genuinely concerned with helping people to feel comfortable among each other instead of giving them reasons to dislike -- and feel superior to -- the others around them.

Rating:
Summary: Where have all the real WASPs gone?
Review: This literature (I use the term loosely) simply is "In Style" parading as "Town and Country".

Rating:
Summary: Things I'd Like to Tell Them
Review: This book may be funny (it's not to me, but some seem to enjoy the meanness, mockery, and pretension that make up this book's humor), but it's not a guide to proper etiquette, and I wish it hadn't been marketed as one. The grrls are the type of people who give etiquette a bad name. An etiquette expert should be someone you'd be delighted to have at your next party, not someone so vicious that you wouldn't want even to speak to her. The grrls focus on style and personal opinions and manage to break some very fundamental etiquette rules. Don't buy this book. Everything you *really* need to be told by an etiquette expert can be read in a book by a worthier author (hello, Judith Martin).

Rating:
Summary: Things you SHOULDN'T need to be told.
Review: The Etiquette Grrls, as they refer to themselves throughout the book, might have some advice to give someone some day, perhaps after they've done something other than dress themselves, shop, make artichoke dip, and then "toss back a few". However, unless you need to be told not to prune the potted plants in hotels (this is really in the book) you certainly do not need thier advice on anything.

They start out by telling you how to set a table (something covered much more adequately in either Emily Post or Miss Manners). They don't get much wrong there, but once they start on fashion their advice becomes laughable. The Etiquette girls have confused Good Manners and Good Grooming with Purchasing Power. The quality that sets one apart from the unwashed masses, is, apparently, the ability to afford Coach bags and Ann Taylor Cashmere twinsets. Indeed, the only thing that seems to save them from the black skirt/twin set automaton look is their bravery in choosing nailpolish colors. Urban Decay creates colors that make the Etiquette grrls feel a little better in their extremely limited world of fashion. On the back of the book, the picture of the Etiquette grrls shows them dressed exactly alike: Little black dress, string of pearls. They look like a matched set of bookends.

When they tackle the social scene, it really does become pathetic. They are truly convinced that making catty remarks about the clothing and appearance of other party guests makes them seem witty. They think their ability to mix canned artichoke hearts with mayonnaise and bake it in the oven makes them accompmlished hostesses.

By the time they get to relationships, they have long since lost all credibility and the book becomes merely laughable. Freud would have a veritable field day with their directions on "disciplining boyfriends" with the nostalgic longing for the
strict discipline of their prep school headmaster. And indeed, if there is a poor chap out there who has really served a two-week sentence of early morning dog-walking for forgetting to call one of the etiquette girls, please let him come forward so that we can get him into therapy as soon as possible.

Their advice on travel really is nothing more than one long whine about how expensive first class has become. There is no good advice here, they simply tell you to keep your shoes on, because the Etiquette Grrls simply do not want to see your socks.
These are not women who have ever taken a 12 hour red-eye in an emergency situation.

The Etiquette Grrls only source of entertainment seems to be Gin and Tonics. They do not talk about many other activities, and, indeed, a High Etiquette Crime seems to be anything that would impede or slow down an Etiquette Grrl from making or purchasing a good stiff drink. Perhaps after their first stint at the Betty Ford clinic, they might broaden their horizons a bit.

One has to also bring the editing of this book into question. They are trying really hard to copy Judith Martin's style of refering to herself in the third person and waxing nostalgic for days of yore, but the Etiquette Grrls can't quite pull it off. They declare themselves as equipped with complete mastery of the English language, Dear Reader. They use Dear Reader ad nauseum (at one point, three times in one three sentence paragraph). Their use of capitalization, which they defend as being perfectly correct, may indeed be so. But correct and irritating are not mutually exclusive terms. The only way this could have been published is if one of the Grrls Mum or Daddy has a connection in the publishing world, and the editor just didn't care enough to put much into it.

In short, if you are interested in matters of Etiquette, please stick with Judith Martin. She is timeless, smart, and witty. The Etiquette girls are confused. Skip this one, I wish I did.
It is the one book I have bought in my long life of reading that I would return.

Rating:
Summary: I'm sorry, were you saying something.. ?
Review: And now.. a reading from Grrls 10:16 - "Nay, but without a plethora of cold hard cash it is impossible to please them: for she that cometh to Grrls must believe that she is a poor skank to them that diligently wear cashmere twinsets."

Amen.