John Searles stopped by the Today show to discuss his latest novel.
Searles’ Single Girls, scheduled for publication Tuesday by Mariner, is a fictionalized account of journalist Helen Gurley Brown’s tenure as editor-in-chief at Cosmopolitan magazine, following the success of her controversial advice book, Sex and the Single Girl. A critic for Kirkus wrote of the novel, “Searles’ affection for the period and his characters infuses the novel with the bright energy of a twirly vintage sundress.”
“I keep telling people if Mad Men and Devil Wears Prada had a book baby, it would be Single Girls,” Searles told the co-hosts. “I write dark suspense novels, but I don’t know if you’ve noticed, the world is a little dark on its own right now, and I wanted to write something instead that’s hopeful, happy, funny, fun, joyful—and that’s what I do with Single Girls.”
He continued, “It’s also a very book club read because of what was going on for women in the 1960s. These women weren’t just editing a magazine, they were really changing culture and women’s lives with Cosmo. And I use real Cosmo cover lines to inspire the story of a sex editor who goes off on an assignment to soak in a champagne-glass hot tub in the Poconos, and a broken-hearted, beautiful books editor who carries around a giant steak knife in her purse in a plan for revenge, and on and on. It’s very fun, but under the surface, my editor always says, it’s sneakily resonant.”
Michael Schaub is a contributing writer.
