Reviewed by Gabrielle Pantera
Rating: 4 Stars
“I had a wonderful gossipy lunch with a chic society hostess I know who’d been to a couple of finishing schools in the sixties,” says Finishing Touches author Hester Browne. “She had the most fabulous stories about walking up and down a catwalk, to perfect a ladylike deportment, and about skiing, drinks, parties and so on.”
“After they’d read The Little Lady Agency, quite a few people said to me, ‘Wouldn’t it be great if there was somewhere that taught you how to be a problem-solving, modern bombshell like Honey how to be stylish but practical, the life and soul of the party, but still self-sufficient?” says Browne. “Like an old finishing school, but with graceful comebacks to cheesy lines, instead of obsessing about gloves. And I thought, actually, yes, wouldn’t that be useful!”
Finishing Touches tells the story of Betsy, left on the doorsteps of the Phillimore academy as a baby. There’s note attached, clipped with an elegant golden bee brooch. Lady Frances Phillimore and her husband adopt the baby girl and the staff at the academy help raise Betsy. When Betsy is old enough to attend the academy, her adoptive father thinks she should go to away to school. It crushes the one dream Betsy has always had of being a real lady.
At age 27, Betsy returns. The school is on the brink of bankruptcy. Lord Phillmore asks Betsy to help to save the academy. Can Betsy find a way to get modern girls who need to know how use computers, eat sushi, handle their finances competently, and navigate the everyday things in life to attend the academy?
“My imagination ran wild, inventing the sort of syllabus you could teach modern women,” says Browne. “A real chocolate box of feminine tricks and tips, real life skills like basic plumbing, but mixed with those elegant secrets that real ladies just seem to know too, such as finding your own style and smart buying in the sales. Lessons I had to pick up for myself along the way, like how to keep champagne from going flat, and what a tracker mortgage is.”
“From there, the story went sideways in my head,” says Browne. “I realized that if old-style finishing schools were designed to cover up inadequate” backgrounds, modern manners are more about knowing who you are and being proud of what you can be. Betsy, the heroine of The Finishing Touches, knows just who she is. An independent, professional woman. But, she has no idea who her parents are or what that might mean to her future. Her journey is about realizing that it doesn’t really matter. It’s so much more important to be the best person you can be and leave the room a happier place.”
“I wandered around Mayfair, where the story is set, absorbing the atmosphere and imagining what goes on behind the tall doors and long windows,” says Browne. I also spent a lot of time reading etiquette books from the ’50s and ’60s. It’s incredible the things ladies used to worry about. We’ve replaced most of those concerns with new ones like cell phone etiquette and how to juggle divorced friends.”
Hester Browne was born in the Lake District, in Cumbria, England. She works between London and Herefordshire, a rural county on the border with Wales. Finishing Touches is her fourth book. Browne is currently working on a romantic novel set at the Scottish border and takes place around a reeling ball.
I’ve been reading Hester Browne’s books for years. Finishing Touches is my favorite. As you read the book you’ll find something about almost all the characters that’s admirable. It will make you think about if you can go back. And if you go back, are you really moving forwards? A great read and well worth reading again.
Browne has a website where the characters of Browne’s books offer solutions to readers’ etiquette dilemmas: thelittleladyagency.com/blog
The Finishing Touches by Hester Browne. Hardcover, 416 pages, Publisher: Pocket; 1 edition, June 9, 2009, Language: English ISBN: 9781416540076
