Single Girls, John Searles (Review by Shanna Thornsbury)

Rating: 4.0/5 Stars

Single Girls is an energetic and whitty novel that captures a pivotal cultural moment through the rise of Helen Gurley Brown and the young women who helped her reinvent Cosmopolitan Magazine in the mid‑1960s. With its blend of historical detail, workplace drama, and personal reinvention, the book offers a vivid portrait of a generation of women determined to carve out space for themselves long before feminism became a mainstream conversation.

The novel opens with Helen at a crossroads. Fresh off the explosive success of Sex and the Single Girl and searching for a platform big enough to match her ambitions. Her persona makes her an unlikely revolutionary, yet the story quickly reveals the steel beneath her soft‑spoken exterior. Once she lands at Cosmopolitan, the narrative expands to include the vibrant, messy, and often hilarious lives of the women she recruits. Their escapades, from disastrous romances to celebrity clashes to ill‑fated hot‑tub adventures give the book a breezy, magazine‑spread charm that keeps the pages turning. I enjoyed getting to know the women early on with the author devoting chapters to each woman in a section called “The Girls”.

What elevates the novel is its willingness to look beyond the glossy surface. Through flashbacks to Helen’s youth and glimpses into the private struggles of her staff, the book explores the emotional and societal pressures shaping these women. It highlights the contradictions of the era; the expectation to be demure yet desirable, ambitious yet accommodating, independent yet marriage minded. The author handles these themes with a light but thoughtful touch, allowing the characters’ experiences to speak for themselves. The prose is lively and cinematic, capturing the thrill of being young in a city on the cusp of cultural transformation. The pacing is brisk, sometimes almost too brisk, certain emotional arcs could have benefited from more depth, and a few character threads feel slightly underdeveloped. Still, the overall effect is engaging and fun. As a work of historical fiction, Single Girls succeeds in honoring Helen Gurley Brown’s legacy without slipping into hagiography. It celebrates ambition, reinvention, and the audacity required to challenge the status quo, all while acknowledging the personal costs of such trailblazing. All in all, a fun read that brings a fascinating era and the women who shaped it to life.