Occasionally the exhaustive list of details reads like a catalog, as we are told what the interiors of elevators looked like, and how the washrooms in private train cars or the drawing room of a Vanderbilt yacht were furnished ... Ms. Tichi offers some good personality descriptions, but overall her approach resembles that of a scientist writing about dissecting aliens (which wouldn’t be a gross mischaracterization in some of these cases). What is lacking is a sense of life and, particularly, of the bitter struggle required to scale the barricades hedging Mrs. Astor’s set and, once inside, to keep one’s place.
Crisp ... Astor’s presence is fleeting throughout, though her influence is unmistakable, especially in making divorce socially acceptable. Presented with a breezy authority that keeps the pages turning, Tichi’s book will captivate those interested in a light look at America’s fashionable gentry of eras past.
