‘Every dress has a story.
Let me tell you mine...’
Dora is in love with a man who barely notices her, has a job she doesn’t care about, and d...
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reviews
Sep 25, 2011
Anne (Booklady)
rated it: 
3.5 Stars
I love vintage clothing and hats! On my closet shelf, many sassy hats from the 30s, 40s, and 50s sit in protective bags while a few prized dresses and suit pieces hang on wooden hangers waiting for the right occasion to be worn. A couple of been thrown out: the yellow sun-dress that witnessed my son’s father breaking my heart. I haven’t worn yellow since. The Aqua jumpsuit witnessed my humiliation – I got fired from my broadcasting job. My kids News Telecast had been cance More...
I love vintage clothing and hats! On my closet shelf, many sassy hats from the 30s, 40s, and 50s sit in protective bags while a few prized dresses and suit pieces hang on wooden hangers waiting for the right occasion to be worn. A couple of been thrown out: the yellow sun-dress that witnessed my son’s father breaking my heart. I haven’t worn yellow since. The Aqua jumpsuit witnessed my humiliation – I got fired from my broadcasting job. My kids News Telecast had been cance More...
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Oct 20, 2011
Karen!
rated it: 
I read this book a while ago and just, well, I forgot completely about it. This is the story of a lost college girl who is in love in love with her uber-flirty boss at the college coffee shop. Dora is smart, organized, and one assumes pretty. But she’s the 90s chick flick kind of pretty where she doesn’t know it and neither do the boys because she dresses all frumpy. She was raised by her grandmother, Mimi, in a microscopic town where Mimi owned and operated a vintage clothing store. Adorable. E
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Apr 18, 2011
Suzanne
rated it: 
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers.
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Mar 24, 2011
Jennifer
rated it:
Quick summary: bleh.
This story starts out well enough. Dora, college student nearing her graduation, must return home when the grandmother who raised her suffers a stroke. Dora ends up running her grandmother’s vintage dress shop as she tries to decide what to do with her life. She discovers that her grandmother has been writing “secret lives” for many of the vintage dresses that she gives out to the customers who buy the dresses.
I liked the idea for the book, but I didn More...
This story starts out well enough. Dora, college student nearing her graduation, must return home when the grandmother who raised her suffers a stroke. Dora ends up running her grandmother’s vintage dress shop as she tries to decide what to do with her life. She discovers that her grandmother has been writing “secret lives” for many of the vintage dresses that she gives out to the customers who buy the dresses.
I liked the idea for the book, but I didn More...
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Mar 20, 2011
Lisa
rated it:
I love the cover of this book, it drew me in, and I think that even if the blip from the back of the book didn't draw me in I would have had to have read it just because of the cover. Kudos to whom ever chose this design!
Okay, on to the book. I enjoyed the story of Dora but also found a couple of things just a little confusing. I feel like I may have missed something or that it is just missing in the story.
Things I enjoyed about this story. Erin McKean did a great j More...
Okay, on to the book. I enjoyed the story of Dora but also found a couple of things just a little confusing. I feel like I may have missed something or that it is just missing in the story.
Things I enjoyed about this story. Erin McKean did a great j More...
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Feb 10, 2011
Brenda
rated it:
Dora has lived with her grandmother Mimi, since the age of one when her parents were killed in a freak accident. Dora is in college, but really she has no idea what she wants to do with her life, she chose her college based on the fact that they offered her a scholarship. When a planned summer job falls thru, an on campus coffee shop job falls in her lap. She is kind of crushing on her boss Gary, a grad student, but since he flirts with everyone she isn't sure how he feels about her.
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Jan 16, 2011
Chrystal
rated it:
I asked for this book because it looked interesting and I thought it would be a cute read. Little did I know that I would fall in love with the characters and get so emotional while reading it. The Secret Lives of Dresses is an absolutely fabulous read: you have such great description of the vintage dresses, mixed with the crazy emotions that an unexpected romance can bring and add a little dash of humour and voila you have the perfect story for a hopeless romantic like myself. There were also
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Jan 14, 2011
Are you the type of person who whenever they buy something vintage or secondhand wonders about the tale behind it, or the life it lived ? Read and enjoyed books like A Vintage Affair by Isabel Wolfe, A Black Tie Affair by Sherill Bodine ? If so then The Secret Lives of Dresses is right up your fashion sense and style.
Dora Winston's life has been anything but going places ever since she packed up, left her grandmothers and headed to college. Now stuck in a dead-end coffee shop job , a boss More...
Dora Winston's life has been anything but going places ever since she packed up, left her grandmothers and headed to college. Now stuck in a dead-end coffee shop job , a boss More...
Aug 22, 2011
♥Xeni♥
rated it:
This book makes me feel like Sarah Addison Allen's works do. This book makes me feel like the yumminess that is Jenna's pies in the movie Waitress. This book gives me hope and joy and happiness. It makes me want to have a daughter and raise her on my own while baking pies together and sewing our own dresses and keeping a magical herb and flower garden together.
This book definitely puts another stone in my Happy Wagon!
I really love how everything works out... although th More...
This book definitely puts another stone in my Happy Wagon!
I really love how everything works out... although th More...
Jan 29, 2012
Lauren
rated it: 
After finishing A Discovery of Witches earlier in the week, The Secret Lives of Dresses came off as… cute. If I hadn’t just finished a book that threw my entire world for a loop and made me positively itching for the next installment, I would have probably had stronger feelings towards this one, but as it is, I am simply left with the word ‘cute’.
The Secret Lives of Dresses follows Dora, a soon-to-be college graduate, as she copes with her grandmother’s failing health. After hearing a More...
The Secret Lives of Dresses follows Dora, a soon-to-be college graduate, as she copes with her grandmother’s failing health. After hearing a More...
Sep 26, 2011
Treasa
rated it:
Dora is about to graduate from college a semester early with a degree in liberal arts, the intent to continue studying that vague topic in grad school, and a job at the campus coffee shop, where she knows more about running the shop than her cute and flirty manager. But when her grandmother, the woman who raised her, has a stroke, everything changes, and Dora rushes home. With Mimi unconscious in the hospital, Dora soon finds herself volunteering to run her grandmother's vintage clothing shop. T
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Feb 09, 2011
LORI
rated it:
Dora was brought up by her grandmother, Mimi, after losing her parents when she was a child. After graduating high school she just seemed to be going through the motions, she attends the college that offered her a scholarship with a major of liberal studies, unsure of what she truly wanted to do in the future. Her planned summer job falls through, but then a job at a coffee shop with a hunky boss just falls into her lap. She is thinking of graduating early and attending grad school, but still
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Apr 06, 2011
Eileen
rated it:
I picked this book up as I was looking for an easy read while on vacation. I wound up reading this book mainly while on the Amalfi Coast, and it was just what I was looking for - light, enjoyable, good story.
Dora is a young woman just about to finish her undergraduate degree when she finds out her grandmother Mimi (who raised her) has had a stroke. She goes back to her hometown to be there for her grandmother, and winds up seeing her old town with new eyes. Mimi owns a vintage clothin More...
Dora is a young woman just about to finish her undergraduate degree when she finds out her grandmother Mimi (who raised her) has had a stroke. She goes back to her hometown to be there for her grandmother, and winds up seeing her old town with new eyes. Mimi owns a vintage clothin More...
Apr 21, 2011
Jennifer
rated it:
The best word I can use to describe this book is “vanilla”. It’s enjoyable, in that I read through 100 pages without realizing it, but ultimately boring and forgettable. I wasn’t attached to any of the characters, and none of them really had a distinct personality. Dora showed some spunk, but not enough for me to feel any emotional attachment to her, and I don’t feel like she grew at all as a character. It was the same with the plot; it plodded along slowly, but nothing ever really happened.
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Mar 09, 2011
Mekerei
rated it:
Dora’s parents were killed when she was a child. She was brought up by her grandmother, Mimi, who runs a vintage dress shop.
She attends a college where she majors in liberal studies and works in a coffee shop. She has a ‘thing’ for her boss, but is really just living life.
She gets a call that her grandmother is in hospital in her home town of Forsyth, North Carolina. She gets in her car and drives home.
As a child Dora played “dress up” with the clothes in Mimi’s sho More...
She attends a college where she majors in liberal studies and works in a coffee shop. She has a ‘thing’ for her boss, but is really just living life.
She gets a call that her grandmother is in hospital in her home town of Forsyth, North Carolina. She gets in her car and drives home.
As a child Dora played “dress up” with the clothes in Mimi’s sho More...
Jun 08, 2011
Kim N
rated it:
I thought I was going to love this book, and I really wanted to love it. I only liked it. The story is unique (to me anyway). Some of the flashbacks were confusing. I'd be a few sentences in when I'd have to stop and go back because I'd gotten confused so when I'd go back and re-read, it was then that I would realize that it was a flashback. I didn't care for the stories of the dresses. With the exception of the last (and most relevant) one, they were all sad or negative. I would have lik
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Aug 22, 2011
Jennifer
rated it:
Honestly, it was the cover that drew me to this book. That and because I kept on seeing it around the bookstore. It's not my typical read, but lately I've been more open to the "chick-lit" genre.
The story is about Dora, an undergraduate who rushes home to news that the grandmother who raised her has suffered a stroke and has been hospitalized.
Her grandmother, Mimi, owned a vintage clothing store in town and Dora assumed the responsibility of running it to keep h More...
The story is about Dora, an undergraduate who rushes home to news that the grandmother who raised her has suffered a stroke and has been hospitalized.
Her grandmother, Mimi, owned a vintage clothing store in town and Dora assumed the responsibility of running it to keep h More...
Aug 14, 2011
SerahRose
rated it:
Enh. Not so good. The premise is excellent. Vintage dresses with secret lives? A lost young woman who finds herself among the treasures of her dying grandmother who was also her guardian? Sounds good, doesn't it? But although it starts out alright, the characters stay pretty 1-dimensional. The protagonist appears to be really intelligent but her demeanor and emotional intelligence are closer to the naivete of a 12 year old while her witty banter and clever one-liner comebacks are worthy o
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Jul 01, 2011
Jodie
rated it:
This book made me wish I had a grandma Mimi who would fill all my closets with vintage clothes, I love vintage clothes. And like the main character never wear them. It was a great distraction from the eternal watching of bubbles bubble and orange crystals turn into yellow. The story was so realistic I could see this person to be real. Actually when I think about it she is pretty similar to myself and some people I know (don't worry I won't name names) in regards to the whole I feel like my life
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Mar 29, 2011
Jill
rated it:
I picked this up to see if it was something my sister might like, as she's the fashionista in the family. But the concept of the secret life stories of dresses intrigued me, so I read it before passing it on. And I did really like the secret lives...there should have been more of them! They were more interesting to me than the unrequited crush of a college student. And I could have heard more about the 'secret lives' of Mimi, Gabby, and Maux...they all seemed like they had others stories to
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Jul 04, 2011
Justine
rated it:
I'm going to coin a new genre called "orphaned girl with quarterlife-crisis return home to ailing/lonely/dead grandmother and rediscover themselves amongst a pile of the grandmothers cache (clothes, books...) as well as snag a cute hometown boy who falls hopeless in love with the new-to-town girl."
On occasion, I do like these books, especially those that add a dash of whimsy (many deal with cooking) but I found this book contrived and soap-operay. It'd be good for a day at More...
On occasion, I do like these books, especially those that add a dash of whimsy (many deal with cooking) but I found this book contrived and soap-operay. It'd be good for a day at More...
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Jul 06, 2011
Jeanne
rated it:
Dora is at loose ends: she’s graduating from college, but is not sure of her next step, she’s got a crush on her boss (who doesn’t date undergrads), and she’s strangely happy just managing the campus coffee shop. All of this changes when she finds out that her grandmother has suffered a stroke.
Mimi, her grandmother, isn’t just anybody. Mimi raised Dora. And she is the successful proprietor of a vintage clothing boutique. Dora doesn’t know what she’d do without Mimi.
S More...
Mimi, her grandmother, isn’t just anybody. Mimi raised Dora. And she is the successful proprietor of a vintage clothing boutique. Dora doesn’t know what she’d do without Mimi.
S More...
May 16, 2011
Amber11
rated it:
This is a chick-flick made book: simple, predictable, pink.
Not exactly a piece of fine literature, just a simple, easy story where everyone is white, well off and has simple existential issues such as "where is my life going". I was expecting more of Erin McKean, her being the word geek she is, I thought she could manage with a better piece of a book, but no. A big disappointment, she shows off all the words she knows -though "erinacious" is not even mentioned. Wh More...
Not exactly a piece of fine literature, just a simple, easy story where everyone is white, well off and has simple existential issues such as "where is my life going". I was expecting more of Erin McKean, her being the word geek she is, I thought she could manage with a better piece of a book, but no. A big disappointment, she shows off all the words she knows -though "erinacious" is not even mentioned. Wh More...
Dec 27, 2011
Anna
rated it:
I enjoyed this easy read of a book. I've been reading Erin's blog for years now and liked the Secret Lives that she posted there. I was impressed that she didn't get too bogged down with the details of the clothing in the book. I find with some books I've read by knitters that include knitting that they can try and drag it in constantly but Erin didn't fall into that trap, she described the clothes simply and clearly so you had a picture in your head and then she moved right on with the plot.
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Feb 28, 2011
Elizabeth
rated it:
a delightful and quick read.
dora is raised by her grandmother mimi after losing her parents as an infant. mimi has a shop that sells vintage dresses. it is in this atmosphere rich with history and fashion in which dora grows up.
dora is a senior in college when mimi has a stroke and is bedridden. dora immediately returns home and without thinking twice, takes over the store. it is in these weeks of caring for her grandmother and looking over the shop that dora realiz More...
dora is raised by her grandmother mimi after losing her parents as an infant. mimi has a shop that sells vintage dresses. it is in this atmosphere rich with history and fashion in which dora grows up.
dora is a senior in college when mimi has a stroke and is bedridden. dora immediately returns home and without thinking twice, takes over the store. it is in these weeks of caring for her grandmother and looking over the shop that dora realiz More...
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Jul 17, 2011
Lora
rated it:
I needed a little light summer reading and this definitely filled that need. It was a cute story of a woman just graduating from college returning home to run her grandmother's vintage clothing store.
While reading all I wanted to do was go out and shop for vintage clothes. And now after I'm done with it all I want to do is wear dresses all the time. I loved that the author really made me feel that way while reading the book.
There wasn't anything outstanding in this book, b More...
While reading all I wanted to do was go out and shop for vintage clothes. And now after I'm done with it all I want to do is wear dresses all the time. I loved that the author really made me feel that way while reading the book.
There wasn't anything outstanding in this book, b More...
Feb 01, 2012
Jennifer
rated it:
Under normal circumstances, I think I would have given this book one less star.
But seeing as how the last two books that I've read consisted of one story with impossibly short, fast-paced chapters, and another novel that had no chapter breaks at all, I felt a bit like Goldilocks discovering Baby Bear's belongings when reading through this one-- juuuust right. And not just in terms of chapter length; the story itself was the perfect hodgepodge of elements, from the writing style to t More...
But seeing as how the last two books that I've read consisted of one story with impossibly short, fast-paced chapters, and another novel that had no chapter breaks at all, I felt a bit like Goldilocks discovering Baby Bear's belongings when reading through this one-- juuuust right. And not just in terms of chapter length; the story itself was the perfect hodgepodge of elements, from the writing style to t More...
Apr 26, 2011
Angela
rated it:
This sweet romance adds the venue of a vintage clothing store as its basic color, a sure winner as far as this fashion merchandising major is concerned. Textured with believable characters, the heroine reminisces about her grandmother's character and personality, deciding she would like to wear her values even though she'd never considered dressing like her. A very, very good read. I'd been wondering what to do with my own vintage collection; now I think I'll will it to my granddaughter.
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Jun 18, 2011
Katie
rated it:
What an a-Dora-ble and original novel!
After her ever-so-stylish and graceful grandmother, Mimi, suffers a stroke, Dora goes home to take care of her grandmother's vintage store and tie up the loose ends.
In going home, Dora learns to take care of herself and learn for what she stands for. She finds that Mimi has begun writing a "secret life" story for each of her vintage dresses
The best part is when Dora learns who wrote the first "secret life" More...
After her ever-so-stylish and graceful grandmother, Mimi, suffers a stroke, Dora goes home to take care of her grandmother's vintage store and tie up the loose ends.
In going home, Dora learns to take care of herself and learn for what she stands for. She finds that Mimi has begun writing a "secret life" story for each of her vintage dresses
The best part is when Dora learns who wrote the first "secret life" More...
Mar 01, 2011
Leigh
rated it:
The premise of this book is great! Vintage dresses, a little romance, a dash of family drama, it was set to be a perfect read. While I did enjoy it, I didn't love it. The stories each dress told were wonderful. It helped move along the story between the main character and her grandmother. Where it hit a snag for me was the the family conflict. I spent a large part of the book waiting for the resolution to the conflict and rooting for the heroine. Once it finally arrived it seemed so anticlimacti
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