Being newly married and in my last year of my 30s this book was perfect for me. The authors writing style is perfection. While the tone reads like you’re chatting with a good friend, the information is thoughtfully presented, nonjudgmental, witty, and filled with obvious love and care for women.

The layout of the book allows you to pick and choose which chapters you want to read based on your topics of interest. That being said, I loved the first chapter so much I just kept going and read it front to back! I’ve already gone back and revisited certain sections (I’ve got to get some sticky notes!!) and have started implementing advice from many of the chapters.

I love the fact that she uses multiple expert voices in each section, tests the advice herself (so funny at times), and then gives a little summary cheat sheet at the end of each chapter.

This book is a must have for any women looking to purposefully navigate their middle years and beyond in the best possible way for themselves.

This lifestyle and beauty guide is written in a fun and engaging way by the author who explores various methods of ‘feeling your best’, speaking to experts, and testing out the methods herself. Each chapter explores a new topic, from skincare to exercise, with diary sections when the author is incorporating the guidance into her daily routine. Unfortunately, I do not think I was the audience for this particular book, all of the guidance felt incredibly basic. I was hoping for something more mature and nuanced, but most of the suggestions were nuggets of information I saw spoken about years ago on TikTok. Certainly, a helpful guide for someone who maybe is starting from scratch, but not revelatory.

This was a miss for me. The author considers 35 to be older and is in her early forties. She interviewed a couple of self proclaimed experts for each section like skin care, heterosexual sex, etiquette, how to buy fine art, sleep, exercise, etc. Each chapter has a lot of rambling about her own experience, advice from the expert or two, and then takeaways that are summarized in a few sentences. None of it is groundbreaking and most of it involves spending a lot of money. It is very rudimentary in most cases, like the advice about money is to find a reputable financial planner and then if you think you can invest $500 a month then do $550 instead.

The author is wealthy, white, straight, married, thin, healthy and in her forties with two young children, a helpful husband and no apparent serious challenges in any way. The book is written only for her own demographic. There is no advice for women with health issues, disabilities, financial problems, relationship difficulties, aging parents, depression, neurodivergence, etc. There is no talk about menopause, even though that’s right around the corner for the author and her demographic and will lead to new issues in most of the topics this book covers.

The gist of the advice is accept your body, eat what you want, lift heavy weights, buy expensive face creams but don’t use a ton of products, stop drinking (but there’s a chapter on how to buy the best wine), get sleep, drink cow milk, eat more protein, make time for friends and creativity, use sex toys and lube, have maintenance sex, and buy fine art that you like and hang it at 53 inches.

I read the entire book but didn’t learn anything new. Those in the author’s demographic who do not research any of these issues already may enjoy it more. Sorry to be harsh, but I would have been very disappointed if I had spent money on this book and was anyone but a wealthy, healthy 40 year old straight white woman with a near perfect life already.

I read a digital review copy of this book via netgalley.