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I haven't really a hometown, as my father is a (now-retired) Naval Officer, but for the most part, my childhood was spent in the Washington, D.C. area, and a quaint village just outside of London, where most of my time was spent having tea in beautiful and traditional London department stores and hotels, visiting the city's museums, and every Stately Home in The Home Counties. All of this is probably what led to a keen lifetime interest in the history of art and architecture and decorative arts, which I studied both on the undergraduate level at Chatham College in Pittsburgh, the third-oldest women's college in the country, and on the graduate level at the University of Virginia. I also spent a summer semester as an undergraduate back in England, at Oxford University (Trinity College), where, inbetween studying Vanbrugh and Keats, I developed a great affinity for G&Ts and Pimm's. As an undergraduate student,I also majored in English Literature (Naturally).

I remained in Pittsburgh (an entirely under-rated city) for some time after college, where I worked in the Publications Department of The Carnegie Museum of Art.

Just before heading off to Charlottesville for grad school, I was fortunate enough to receive an offer from Penguin Putnam (Berkley) for my first book, Things You Need to Be Told, co-authored with Lesley Carlin, a friend from those long-ago days of middle school, before I departed Western Massachusetts for a quiet teen-age life at Westover, a girls' boarding school in Connecticut.

In short order, we were asked by our publishers to write a sequel, the cleverly-titled, More Things You Need to be Told

In January of 2000, Lesley and I created and authored EtiquetteGrrls.com, which we're pleased, and still rather suprised, gained a small cult following. (We're really not quite sure why.) In 2003, EtiquetteGrrlStyle.com was launched, a spin-off site covering the many other topics which interest our readers but don't quite fall under the umbrella of Matters of Etiquette, such as home decorating and cooking.

I have also written a weekly humorous etiquette advice column for Velocity, a hip weekly publication of the Louisville Courier-Journal, as well as a number of non-etiquette-related articles for nationally-circulated home & garden magazines.

My latest project, Bygone Knits, http://www.bygoneknits/blogspot.com, is a blog devoted to the art of vintage knitting, from the 1910s-1960s, and how these vintage patterns and fashions are connected to the history of art and design, as well as cultural history.

Praise for TYNTBT/MTYNTBT:

- "The Etiquette Grrls are very funny, very wise, and very in your face. It's easier to learn manners when you're laughing rather than crying." -- Letitia Baldrige, author, etiquette expert, White House Social Secretary to First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy.

- "I laughed aloud. Those girls have got something there." -- Robert Sean Leonard, actor.

- "I fell completely in love with [The Etiquette Grrls]...they devote as much energy and enthusiasm to a thrift-store place setting as [Emily] Post did to Spode china and the heirloom silver...Their advice is better than that from some of their elders." -- P.J. O'Rourke, author, humorist, satirist. From The New York Times Book Review.

- "If The Girls from The Rules...had a clue, they'd...start paying attention to this ultimate how-to girl manifesto." -- Marcelle Karp, co-author of The Bust Guide to the New Girl Order and co-founder of Bust Magazine

- "Outrageous fun." -- Houston Chronicle

- "Lessons that we would all do well to learn...such good sense." -- Montreal Gazette

- "Very tongue-in-cheek but quite palatable, practical advice for those not in the know." -- Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
]]> female 1975/01/20 179272 411978 042518370X 9780425183700 13 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174517143m/411978.jpg http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174517143s/411978.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/411978.Things_You_Need_to_Be_Told 3.58 60
It is indeed a Tacky, Rude World which we inhabit. The Etiquette Grrls have decided that things are simply getting out of hand, and they have Taken It Upon Themselves to step in with a helpful guide to navigate the Etiquette Quandaries in your day-to-day life. They dish up advice on cohabitation, letter-writing, telephoning, traveling, grooming, drinking, dining, dating, and marriage and, it would be Terribly Rude of you not to pay attention.

Who are they, you ask, to be writing such a book? The Etiquette Grrls are graduates of New England Preparatory Schools and Prestigious Colleges; they are throwers of Great Parties; they can hold their liquor; their expertise on fashion and makeupand-especially Subversive Nail Polish colors-knows no bounds; they wear Doc Martens with their cashmere twin sets; and, most important, they know what they're talking about.
</br> The Etiquette Grrls' advice has been featured in Ladies Home Journal, Chicago Sun-Times, and Business Week Online. Their own website, EtiquetteGrrls.com-cited as one of the best on the Web by excite.com, best-of-the-web.net, projectcool.com, and college newspapers throughout the country-provides monthly features and weekly responses to the Etiquette Quandaries of their loyal readers.

Praise for Things You Need to Be Told:

- "I laughed aloud. Those girls have got something there." -- Robert Sean Leonard, actor.

- "I fell completely in love with [The Etiquette Grrls]...they devote as much energy and enthusiasm to a thrift-store place setting as [Emily] Post did to Spode china and the heirloom silver...Their advice is better than that from some of their elders." -- P.J. O'Rourke, author, humorist, satirist, The New York Times Sunday Book Review.

- "If The Girls from The Rules...had a clue, they'd...start paying attention to this ultimate how-to girl manifesto." -- Marcelle Karp, co-author of The Bust Guide to the New Girl Order and co-founder of Bust Magazine

- "Outrageous fun." -- Houston Chronicle

- "Lessons that we would all do well to learn...such good sense." -- Montreal Gazette

- "Very tongue-in-cheek but quite palatable, practical advice for those not in the know." -- Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
]]> 233210 3.61 88 20 233207 3.62 89 20 233209 3.62 89 20 2001 411977 0425190188 9780425190180 7 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174517143m/411977.jpg http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174517143s/411977.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/411977.More_Things_You_Need_To_Be_Told 3.68 28 Things You Need to Be Told offer more advice-pertinent to today's issues, and filled with both hilarious wit and practical common sense.]]> 233209 3.62 89 20 233207 3.62 89 20 233210 3.61 88 20 2003 2416097 1585421316 9781585421312 0 http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-111x148.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-60x80.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2416097.Things_You_Need_to_Be_Told_An_Etiquette_Manifesto 4.00 1
It is indeed a Tacky, Rude World, which we inhabit. The Etiquette Grrls have decided that things are simply getting out of hand, and they have Taken It Upon Themselves to step in with a helpful guide to navigate the Etiquette Quandaries in your day-to-day life. They dish up advice on cohabitation, letter-writing, telephoning, traveling, grooming, drinking, dining, dating, and marriage and, it would be Terribly Rude of you not to pay attention.

Who are they, you ask, to be writing such a book? The Etiquette Grrls are graduates of New England Preparatory Schools and Prestigious Colleges; they are throwers of Great Parties; they can hold their liquor; their expertise on fashion and makeupand-especially Subversive Nail Polish colors-knows no bounds; they wear Doc Martens with their cashmere twin sets; and, most important, they know what they're talking about.

The Etiquette Grrls' advice has been featured in Ladies Home Journal, Chicago Sun-Times, and Business Week Online. Their own website, EtiquetteGrrls.com-cited as one of the best on the Web by excite.com, best-of-the-web.net, projectcool.com, and college newspapers throughout the country-provides monthly features and weekly responses to the Etiquette Quandaries of their loyal readers. ]]> 233209 3.62 89 20 233207 3.62 89 20 0 7128937 0641608578 9780641608575 0 http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-111x148.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-60x80.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7128937-things-you-need-to-be-told 0.0 0 233208 0.0 0 0 233207 3.62 89 20 2001