What Pretty Girls Are Made Of

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To Mom, Dad, and Justin

Acknowledgments

T
wenty years ago, my brother and I promised each other that if we ever had the opportunity to give public thanks, we would acknowledge the other first. I’m honored to be able to keep that promise: Justin, thank you for giving me a true understanding of why having a sibling is a blessing.

Mom and Dad, you nurtured my creativity, never stifling it (or me). I feel so lucky to have been raised and led by such kind, intelligent, and supportive role models. I love you with all my heart.

It’s true that it takes a village to write a book, and each of you has shared your knowledge, observations, advice, and friendship with me, for which I’m extremely grateful.

My village:

Britton Schey, Courtney Sheinmel, Elizabeth Wolff, Jaclene Paolucci, Jeff Stern, Jennifer Saraf Miles, Ethan Friedman, Mandy Cooper, Marni & Felicia Rothman, Laurie Kilkenny, Saul Stein, Raina Miranda, Leslie Bennetts & Emily Gerard, Hayley Dickson, Gail Gonzales, Jocelyn Steiber, Bridget Siegel Hazan, David and Simon Gaspar, Tali Shine, Alison Pace, Jaspre Guest & Fabrizio Babino of Noise784, Tessa Klein Harber, Ben Coes, Suzanne Goldman, George Tetlow, Marci Weisler, Daniel Martin, Jo Piazza, Samantha Aaron Goodman, Light Watkins, Dhru Purohit (Dhru-ru, the wonderful, selfless guru), and Jessica Abo—my Jewish Oprah.

Thank you to Dorothy “Grandma” Marks; Dan Kraft and Meryl Strutin; and Fran and Marvin Kraft, who I am fortunate to call my family.

My teachers:

Ms. Bright, thank you for opening my eyes to literature. I have always admired you.

Joseph D’Angelo, remember when I asked you at age 13 what you thought I’d be when I grew up? I laughed the day you said I’d be a writer, never quite imagining that you’d be correct!

David Downs, in the Struble you became my North Star, and you have shined brightly as my guide ever since. I have endless gratitude and love for you.

My mentors (and now friends):

Sherie Alden, the original; Natalie Vacca, the producer who left the ultimate impression; Jessica Morgan, always the role model; Larry King, the legend.

My team:

Sofia Panagopoulos and Claire Stephens, thank you for diving into this process with me.

Suki Song, for this beautiful cover.

Pilar Queen, for your advice at the inception of this process.

Vanessa King, your early thoughts helped give this book a future and your selflessness in connecting me with Haylie Duff changed my TV career, for which I’m thankful every day.

Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus, I was a fan after reading
The Nanny Diaries
, never imagining that you’d become good friends. Thank you for your guidance, encouragement, and unwavering kindness.

Abby Zidle, my biggest concern in finding an editor/publisher was that he or she wouldn’t “get” my voice. Thank you for taking a chance on
Pretty Girls
—I hope this is the first of many projects together. #yougetme

Lucinda Blumenfeld, my agent in life and literature. You changed my life with one word: “yes,” and my dream of telling this story was made possible because of your faith in me and in it. Thank you for taking a first chance . . . and second, one year later. My gratitude to you is unwavering.

My Core Four:

Jill Bernard, Rachel Gaspar, Pamela Goldman, and Meghan Markle—I love you each so much.

Jill, you have the instincts of a lioness and our 20-year friendship is something I hold dear to my heart. To have a friend who is both as honest and loving as you are is a gift.

Rach, from the moment you took my hand and dragged me around the room, we were eternally connected. “A Shayna Maidel” is Yiddish for “a pretty girl.” How special is that? You embody
What Pretty Girls Are Made Of
. I love you and your family beyond.

Pam, my sister, we met on holy ground and our fated relationship is truly sacred and one that I so cherish.

Meg, thousands of miles apart but together every day, more successful than we were fifteen years ago yet at our cores we haven’t changed. You are a part of me, and our rare, deep friendship is overwhelmingly precious.

My British Knight:

Gavin Alexander Jordan. ♥

This story may not have painted the most positive picture of the cosmetics industry, but that was only through the eyes and experiences of Alison Kraft. Makeup—and the business of it—is a thriving, wonderful industry that promotes what this novel is all about: the importance of feeling pretty and knowing your value, whatever that means to each and every one of us. Strive for whatever makes you feel pretty—w
hether on the inside, the outside, or both. Trust me, it’s worth it! #prettyis

CHAPTER ONE

See a New Resilience Emerge

W
ow, she looks just like your ex-girlfriend, doesn’t she?” I heard the casting director remark, a little too loudly, as I walked out of my last audition.

I knew right then that I didn’t have the part.

I was always told that not getting roles wasn’t personal. But how was that not personal?

That familiar pang of disappointment twisted through my stomach, though I was only auditioning for the role of “star chicken” in a traveling children’s show. It wasn’t that I wanted this particular part so badly. I had spent so many years chasing my dream that any role would have validated my status as a professional actress. Even a floppy chicken.

Maybe it just wasn’t meant to be. My last two roles had been a potato in an experimental theater production, and a polyester-clad fern in a commercial for plant food. At this rate, my tombstone would read
Highly Trained Performing Salad
. At least in this case, I wouldn’t have to endure the agony of waiting for the phone to ring and the implied “Don’t call us; we’ll call you.”

It was a warm day in April, and the streets of New York City were buzzing with people who actually worked during the day, rushing to get their lunches. I decided to walk off my disappointment, since my only obligation that afternoon was to sell subscription packages at Manhattan Theatre Club. Of my various odd jobs—the others were market research focus groups,
Sex and the City
tour guide gigs (hey, it was performing), and dog walking—theater fundraising was the most professional. But I needed all of them to piece together my rent.

My mind drifted to the audition I’d had before the chicken one.

“We’re ready for you, Alison,” the casting director had said as she ushered me into the audition room. At the table in the middle of the space waited the playwright and the director. “I’ll read the first scene with you today, and if we have time, the second.”

My hands began to shake as I moved the chair to face her. My toes were freezing in my shoes so I clenched and unclenched them. Time slowed down and beads of sweat dripped in places I didn’t know had sweat glands. As if it had a life of its own, my body betrayed me, and my mind couldn’t keep up.

Needless to say, we didn’t get to the second scene. After following my dream for a solid eight years, I went to every audition accompanied by anxiety. With time and experience, audition nerves should decrease, not increase, right? Where I used to walk into an audition room to face casting directors confidently, I now shook like a brittle leaf.

I knew that if I didn’t leap out of showbiz before turning thirty—a mere two years away—I would regret not pursuing other passions. Even with my Northwestern University theater training, it was clearly time to close the door.

My immediate pursuit was of a more tangible reward: a Starbucks chai tea soy latte. And thank God for plastic, where the damage of a $4.76 drink could be put out of mind with one sweet swipe.

“Oh my goodness, I’m so sorry,” I said as my chai bumped into a woman’s coffee at the milk station. Thankfully, only a little spilled out. My haze clearly hadn’t dissipated.

“No worries at all,” said the pleasant middle-aged woman, clad in a ’90s shade of dark brown lipstick à la Shannen Doherty circa
90210
. She smiled, and I imagined how much brighter that smile would look rimmed in baby pink. “I was going to dump out some of the coffee to add milk anyway, so you sped up the process.”

I laughed inside, glad for her kindness.

“Do you work around here?” she asked politely as she mopped up my mess with her napkin.

“Y-yes,” I said, stuttering a bit. “I work right across the street. You?”

“Oh no, but my husband does. I just came into the city for a little day of wandering and to meet him for lunch,” she said, a singsong lilt to her voice. “What do you do?”

“Makeup,” I said without blinking. “I work for a makeup company. And the hottest lip color of the spring is baby pink, by the way. It would look amazing on you!” Much easier to go out on a limb and randomly suggest a new lip shade to a stranger than have to endure the routine “I’m an actress” conversation.

“Oh, what do you act in?”

“I’m just auditioning at the moment, so nothing right now.”

“Have you been in anything I would know?”

“
Not if you blinked during the opening credits of
Pitch Perfect.
”

The sides of her brown lips turned up and her eyes sparkled.

“What a fabulous job! I’m not creative at all, but wow, how fun makeup must be for you. And thank you for the tip!”

“It’s my dream. I’m living my dream,” I gushed, smiling at the fact that I was finally doing some decent acting today.

Before my nose started to grow, I hightailed it out of Starbucks and back onto the bustling streets. That poor woman needed more than new lipstick, but it was a good start, I thought.

I remembered a makeup class I’d taken at Bergdorf Goodman as a high schooler. “You’ve got talent, young lady,” Bobbi Brown, the makeup guru, had told me. “Your eyeliner looks perfect, even at the corners. The toughest part.” I had felt so important.

Since I was a little girl, playing in my mother’s makeup box—lipstick everywhere but my lips—makeup excited me. But my curiosity about the cosmetics industry was piqued that day at Bergdorf’s. I was a total product whore. My bathroom housed the latest gadgets for whitening and brightening and sample-size creams, soaps, and lipstick colors. Working in makeup would be a natural fit. Real makeup, though. Not like the Manhattan elementary school fair face-painting circuit I did every fall. (Another odd job.)

As I walked, my mind raced about my potential new life. I needed to get rid of the constant pit of dread in my stomach. I would turn auditions into job interviews as soon as possible.

For years, my days had been so filled with auditions, acting gigs, and these other piecemeal positions that I couldn’t fathom getting up and going to the same job every day. I craved normalcy and wanted to use my brain in new ways, but what would that actually be like?
Amazing
, I told myself. It would be amazing.

By the end of April,
I still couldn’t admit to my agent, friends, or college acting professors that I was going to make the big switch. If pursuing the dream had been difficult, halting that pursuit was even more emotionally taxing. I’d told everyone and anyone since the age of three—when I performed my own abridged version of
Annie
for my classmates daily (how annoying for them!)—that acting was my future. Now all I could hear in my head was the word “failure.” My sun-filled, yellow-walled apartment couldn’t lift my down mood, and neither could Jill, my surrogate sister and roommate of six years (two in college and four in New York).

Instead, I found solace in more Fatty Sundays chocolate-covered pretzels and buttered-popcorn Jelly Bellys than I would like to admit.

While particle-board IKEA furniture had served me well for almost a decade, the thought of finally being able to replace it with something not made of sawdust and glue encouraged me to ask everyone I knew if they’d heard of open positions.

“I’m sending you an article that I just read in
Crain’s New York Business
,” blurted Madison, my bestie from the westie, over the phone on a warm day in early June. Though it was probably warmer for her in Los Angeles. “It’s about this makeup company, Sally Steele Cosmetics. Do you know it?”

“I do, yes,” I said. “They have a makeup studio on the Upper West. I think that’s where my crazy aunt Farrah gets her makeup done.”

“Your crazy, psychopath, stalker aunt Farrah? Who you almost needed a restraining order against in college?”

“Yep, that’s the one!”

“Well, we can worry about her if we must,” she replied, “but you have to read this article. I have a good feeling about them.”

She continued with her best Diane Sawyer impression, being the talented actress that she was. “The article says that even in these tough economic times, Sally Overmeyer Steele’s company is growing exponentially, and that it’s constantly hiring to keep up with the growth.”

“I have to work for them!” I said impulsively. “And you need to forget acting and go into news. Seriously. Let’s find a way in. Upper West Side, right?”

“Yep,” Madison replied, in her typically blunt tone. “Now do something about it.” Since meeting during freshman year of college, we’d had the special ability to read each other, even though our lives kept us at opposite ends of the country.

“Do you think I can just drop by?” I asked.

“Why not? Just go for it. You’re so good at putting yourself out there. I know they’ll fall in love with you.”

“I’ll text a picture of my interview outfit to you for approval later tonight. Good?”

“You know it,” she said, and I could hear her smiling through the phone receiver three thousand miles away.

Twenty blocks north of my
apartment and straight across town, past my local DavidsTea and Ess-a-Bagel, was the Sally Steele Cosmetics Studio. I had spent an hour the night before writing my cover letter and doing online research about Sally Steele and her company. I felt ready to put myself out there. I woke up, put on my Madison-approved black skirt with silver trim and a fitted three-quarter-sleeve sweater—professional yet fun—and sat in front of my mirror, unsure of how to do my makeup for the big event.

The goal was to look my age, late twenties, and not like the sixteen-year-old for whom I was often mistaken. I settled on purple eye shadow to bring out the green of my eyes, feathery lashes, flushed cheeks, and nude lips. My pale skin and light eyes sparkled, looking more Irish or English than Long Island Jewish.

I looked at my outfit. Fitted enough to highlight my size-eight curves while still hiding those pesky back bra lines. Back fat. Hate it. Did I look skinny? (Always a concern before an audition.) I had to remind myself that cosmetics was a business, and I was probably not going to be judged by my weight for this one. After a half hour of straightening my unruly blond curls and topping off my outfit with platform heels not really meant for walking, I set out to make a career in cosmetics my new reality.

When I arrived at the Sally Steele Cosmetics Studio, the lights and the black power cords lining the floor made me think I had just missed a photo shoot. I didn’t want to intrude, but since I was prepared—physically and mentally—I was going in no matter what.

“Hi, can I help you?” said an attractive older woman. Picture your bubbe with tight pants, short coiffed hair, and style.

“Hi, yes, I hope so,” I replied timidly. “I would love to speak with Helen Grossberg, if she’s here.”

I had read that Helen ran the wedding business for Sally Steele Cosmetics. I figured I should start with her, since it was a shot in the dark whether Sally would even be in.

“I’m Helen,” the older woman said, smiling warmly.

“Oh, great. I’m Alison. I read about you and your company in
Crain’s
,” I told her. “I’m not sure if you can help me, but I’m looking for a new job, and after I read about Sally Steele Cosmetics in the article, I wanted to drop off a résumé.”