Cecelia Tishy

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: This illustrated Gilded Age etiquette guide offers "proof that sliding around the naughty edges of society can be as informative as it is entertaining." (Alida Becker, The New York Times Books Review)

Mark Twain called it the Gilded Age. Between 1870 and 1900, the United States' population doubled, accompanied by an unparalleled industrial expansion and an explosion of wealth. America was the foremost nation of the world, and New York City was its beating show more heart. There, the richest and most influential—Thomas Edison, J. P. Morgan, Edith Wharton, the Vanderbilts, Andrew Carnegie, and more—became icons, whose comings and goings were breathlessly reported in the papers of Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst. It was a time of abundance, but also bitter rivalries. The Old Money titans found themselves besieged by a vanguard of New Money interlopers eager to gain entrée into their world. Into this morass of money and desire stepped Caroline Astor.

An Old Money heiress of the first order, Mrs. Astor was convinced that she was uniquely qualified to uphold the manners and mores of 19th century America. "What would Mrs. Astor do?" became the question every social climber sought to answer. This work serves as a guide to manners as well as an insight to Mrs. Astor's personal diary and address book. Ceceilia Tichi invites us on a beautifully illustrated tour of the Gilded Age, transporting readers to New York at its most fashionable.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: So much beauty and opulence shoved up to the surface by so much greed and theft.

Let's not go there this close to the leanest Yule in many a long year. We're not remotely out of the woods economically, but this book is about a time where the economic situation was far, far worse. It's discussed in here, though not exhaustively. It's a social history, it's about how etiquette came to matter so much, which of course requires we know a bit about how the men, all men, stole...made, sorry...so very much money to support the women's social construct.

the lady herself, in her finery painted for posterity

The very idea of entertaining at home was made aspirational by the "Four Hundred" (the number who could fit in Mrs. Astor's ballroom); as late as the 1960s, the idea was prevalent, and while the means changed, the manners barely did.

my generation certainly heard Emily Post's name, same woman and mostly the same advice

Lina Astor was an insufferable snob. Her ballroom was for "the best people," whose money was so old no one living could remember the hustler who got it. Nouveau riche industrialists' wives need not apply. It was a world she ruled, but it was a reign of terror that had to be agreed to; there was nothing forcing anyone into this restrictive social contract except made-up ideas like prestige.


two robber-baron "homes," Manhattan and Newport

Oh, and money of course. Lots and lots and lots of money.Author Tichi does not bear down heavy on the whole "robber baron" thing. There's no way around the money ocean they swam in. It's rather the point of a beautiful, illustrated book about luxury.


smart excessories...I mean accessories!...for Madame and Sir

It's astonishing what boredom does to a person. This time period, up to then the richest in world history, led to wealth disparities but also to the cementing of the idea that one could live a life not mere have an existence. Vacations to exotic places, to different places than you frequented as usual anyway, and recreational shopping (a Georgian idea embraced effusively by the Astor set) became ordinary for these wealthy folk:


shopping and sitting, two "fun" things

What I enjoyed most about this read was the way Author Tichi left it to me to judge, presenting facts and showing (as you see) examples and artifacts for me to decide what I thought about. We are in a new Gilded Age of wealth disparity, and at an economic crossroads, just like these folk were. We need to think carefully about what we individually do, because that becomes by default collective action.

The gifting season should be replete with beautiful tokens of love and affection; that doesn't mean they can't be thought-provoking, interesting, and relevant, too.

then, a residence; now a museum show less

The Publisher Says: How the Prohibition law of 1920 made alcohol, savored in secret, all the more delectable when the cocktail shaker was forced to go “underground”

“Roaring Twenties” America boasted famous firsts: women’s right to vote, jazz music, talking motion pictures, flapper fashions, and wondrous new devices like the safety razor and the electric vacuum cleaner. The privations of the Great War were over, and Wall Street boomed.

The decade opened, nonetheless, with a shock show more when Prohibition became the law of the land on Friday, January 16, 1920, when the Eighteenth Amendment banned “intoxicating liquors.” Decades-long campaigns to demonize alcoholic beverages finally became law, and America officially went “dry.”

American ingenuity promptly rose to its newest challenge. The law, riddled with loopholes, let the 1920s write a new chapter in the nation’s saga of spirits. Men and women spoke knowingly of the speakeasy, the bootlegger, rum-running, black ships, blind pigs, gin mills, and gallon stills. Passwords (“Oscar sent me”) gave entrée to night spots and supper clubs where cocktails abounded, and bartenders became alchemists of timely new drinks like the Making Whoopee, the Petting Party, the Dance the Charleston. A new social event—the cocktail party staged in a private home—smashed the gender barrier that had long forbidden “ladies” from entering into the gentlemen-only barrooms and cafés.

From the author of Gilded Age Cocktails, this book takes a delightful new romp through the cocktail creations of the early twentieth century, transporting readers into the glitz and (illicit) glamour of the 1920s. Spirited and richly illustrated, Jazz Age Cocktails dazzles with tales of temptation and temperance, and features charming cocktail recipes from the time to be recreated and enjoyed.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: A very interesting social history of the life and times in which the cocktail culture arose. I was most impressed with the beautiful book design and illustrations, starting with the frontispiece and title page:

Handsome, easy to read, and very well presented. I'm always happy when I see this level of attention from a publisher. Of course, this is only the very first thing we'll see and thus might not see this level of attention inside. It does happen.

Not in this book. An example of a recipe spread:

and this is a character illustration spread:

Clearly presented text, charming images, and then there's the content. Author Tichi's erudition really shows in her clear prose (not unexpected from a Vanderbilt University lecturer in US History of the Modern Age) and her research is amply documented. What it isn't is cited in the text itself...not a terrible flaw in a popular history aimed at intelligent and curious laypeople. Had her audience been fellow academics, she has the information in her bibliography so she could have made citations with ease.

The extent of Prohibition was a mere thirteen years from enactment and enforcement to repeal. It changed the US forever. So many things we take for granted now...government licensing of food and drink establishments, police with paramilitary powers, a strong political urge to control peoples' personal lives to "improve" their morals...started or accelerated during Prohibition. Author Tichi's own academic interests are defined by these changes and their cultural concomitants in literature, art, and technology. In her afterword, she shares the personal dimension of her interest in the era. It is a well-written work of social history, focusing on social issues that arose or were centered at that time, and still a lovely object suitable for Yule gifting to your brother or father. They'll enjoy the history. They appreciate the cocktails' charmingly presented methods and presentations.

A hardcover book is very much a gift item in this day and time. We've had a few supply-chain issue years what with the COVID plague. The charm of this affordable book is that it's been out for a year-plus now and is in stock...an order placed will be delivered quite quickly. Not a small consideration.

I recommend this as a good gifting idea on a topic of enduring interest. It's solid value for money. And it's readily available. show less

Roddy DeVere is interested when Martin Coates, an old law school ally now living near Chicago, suggests that they go into business together making bitters, an essential ingredient in the cocktails Roddy is so good at inventing. He and his wife Val are therefore a bit nonplussed when Martin begs for their help: his wife Lydia had fallen down a staircase in their home and died, but the police in Chicago suspect that he might have killed her and Martin is desperate for his name to be cleared. show more He quickly entangles the DeVeres in his family’s drama, including his brother Owen who has received the bulk of the estate of their multi-millionaire father; his sister Celia, given a measly one million but determined to spend it all as quickly as possible; and the enigmatic, rather sinister, Sara Dow, who was a kind of companion and friend to Lydia who also received a hefty legacy when Lydia died. Martin himself has only been left the original family business of Vitalene, an elixir very popular for all sorts of health conditions, but really a deadly concoction that Martin wants to discontinue. As the DeVeres travel to Chicago to try to unravel the threads of this deadly case, they discover that even their status high up in New York Society won’t protect them from all the Windy City has to offer….This is the fourth book in the Val and Roddy DeVere series, and like the three before it, there’s a lot to chew on here. Ms. Tichi is an expert in the history of the Gilded Age in New York (represented here by the year 1899) and her depictions of life both in the upper and lower echelons of society are very well researched and described; her branching out to Chicago in this book also rings very true, from the thousands of homeless, hopeless and threatening people on the streets of that city to the impulses behind the founding of Hull House, an early example of social work in practice. I also loved the passion with which the scourge of so-called “miracle cures” of the era is addressed; these elixirs were truly dangerous compounds, as likely to poison you as to addict you. I think one should read these books in sequence, as I almost always say of series books, but if the reader were to pick this one up first, on a whim, s/he would not be disappointed; recommended! I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. show less

I received an ARC of this novel in exchange for an honest review. Valentine and Roderick DeVere are in the top echelon of New York City society - well, Roderick is anyway, as his ancestors had been there since before the settlement was called New Amsterdam; Val is from the West, where her father amassed a fortune from silver mining and whose money has rescued the DeVere’s from financial embarrassment. One of the perks of their position is their proximity to the new Central Park, an show more expansive area ostensibly open to all but in reality primarily the purview of the rich. When several young women are found in the Park strangled to death, and a variety of bombings and incidents of arson also plague the area, Val decides to come to the aid of Detective Finlay, a morose police officer whose job is in jeopardy if he cannot solve the crimes. But without more information, Val risks becoming a crime victim herself…. This is the first novel in a projected series by Cecelia Tichi, and it is clear that she knows her place and period; she has written about the Gilded Age (and about cocktails, which feature throughout this novel) in her role as an academic. I very much enjoyed Val’s feistiness, which is inextricable from her Western roots, and Roddy’s swings between fond husband and upright member of Society are very amusing, although I don’t know enough about the period to know if Val could really have had the degree of freedom that she does in this book. Nevertheless, I look forward to reading more of this couple and their adventures - not to mention those of their dog Velvet! Recommended. show less