Venus Envy

Louise Bagshawe

Average Rating 8/10 (1 Review)

Alex Wilde has got it bad... She's 27, single, bored out of her tiny mind at work and surrounded by flatmates that would make a glitterball feel square. She's got the world's worst case of Venus Envy.

Her little sister Gail is pretty, waif-like and irritating. Femme fatale Keisha is flying up the ladder of success at work. And Bronwen is so hip, it's a miracle she can walk at all!

It's time for Alex to put on her TDO (Red or Dead would do nicely), get out and strut her stuff - it's time she gave Venus a run for her money.

'Bagshawe has pulled it off yet again… you'll be absolutely riveted.'

'Bagshawe has the classic blockbuster formula at her fingertips and she's not afraid to use it.'

Review by Chrissi (010302) Rating (8/10)

Review by Chrissi
Rating 8/10
It was not until I started reading this that I realised that I had read Tall Poppies by the same author, and had enjoyed that one too. Venus envy is about the relationships that some women have with friends and sisters, some women just seem that little bit more ruthless than others, a little bit more to be men's women, rather than women's women, and here we see a view of women who want men for what they can get from them, rather than what they can give to each other.

It made me laugh, especially the bit where the art gallery has the big party and Alex (we are rooting for Alex all through the story) ends up in a see through dress, soaked with water that was supposed to put out the fire. It is the reason that flimsy dresses are so frightening, because you cannot get a great deal underneath. (No rigging, do you understand?)

It really is just an extension of the song, "girls just wanna have fun", and we like to read stories that reflect this, I am not a Wuthering Heights fan, and I like to smile while I read, and this made me smile. I am a person of simple pleasures, after all.

(Note: I read Wuthering heights finally about eight years after I was supposed to have read it for A level. I really did not manage to complete it for the exam, and it has since become my opinion that reading books for exams is enough to put people off reading for pleasure.)
Chrissi (1st March 2002)