Inventing Beauty

A very interesting and fun read. Highly informative and entertaining at the same time. There is so much information packed into this book it could easily have been a heavy, dry read, but it was not at all! It has a nice fluidity, story-telling elements, and bits of funny commentary that make it a fun, easy read. Each chapter focuses on a particular area on/of the body or face (as in lips, eyes, hair etc.). Each chapter goes into as much detail as it can within the limited amount of pages.

The book has a good amount of pictures consisting mainly of ads (which I personally enjoyed a lot) and (mostly) patent drawings. I found the patent drawings interesting but pretty hideous, they're just very ugly cartoons. They left me wishing there had been some more pretty pictures to counterbalance the ugly (it's a beauty book after all!). I won't complain too much though, since the usual complaint is that beauty books have too many pretty pictures and not much information.

Pictures notwithstanding, the book has a wealth of text and visual information about the history and evolution of beauty standards based on beauty inventions patented from the mid-19th century to the mid-20th century. I learned, and giggled, a lot!

As a side note, I found myself googling a lot of people, places, and things being referenced in the book as I read. There are many interesting things that are not illustrated in the book and so I encourage you do to the same!