Book Review:  Little Black Dress by Susan McBride

by Tif Sweeney

According to Coco Chanel, “a woman without a little black dress has no future.”  In Susan McBride’s Little Black Dress (LBD), it is the dress itself that shapes the future of three women.  It all began years ago when the dress appeared in the lives of two sisters, Anna and Evie, resulting in the disappearance of the former on the eve of her wedding.  Evie is left with the silk garment and an absence that changes the family forever, for both the good and the bad.

Today, the lives of Evie and her daughter, Toni are still being affected by that fateful night.  The set of events that were the result of that night can no longer be held as a secret and when Toni returns home to look after her comatose mother, the secrets rapidly begin to unravel.

LBD is more than a story of magic and the garment that binds three women together.  It is about love, life, family, and the successes and struggles that accompany them.  At McBride’s release party, she said LBD was “the book she needed to write.”  She sends the reader on a roller coaster ride of emotions, the same experience I imagine she had when writing it.  Magically, it has turned into a book that needs to be read because of the reality within that we can all relate to in one way or another.

I will leave you with my favorite quote that wraps up LBD so well . . .

“She decided there was definitely something magical about knowing where you came from, who you came from – the people no matter how imperfect – and accepting all their warts.  It was never too late to establish those connections, was it?” (p. 256)

For more information on LBD and the author, visit Susan McBride Books.  And, if you missed coverage on McBride’s release party, complete with model little black dresses, visit A Magical Evening with Susan McBride.