Review of The Valley of the Dolls

By: Jacqueline Susann

            Set in the 1950s, through the early 60s, Valley of the Dolls, is about three women, Anne Wells, Jennifer North, and Nealy O’Hara who have ambitions to become successful in show business.  Unfortunately, they learn the price for success, especially for women, can destroy you.

            Valley of the Dolls is a story that explores the ugly side of show business and how it is often harder for women due to the pressures of trying to stay fit, beautiful and young.  Sadly, things haven’t changed that much, and the only difference is the drugs women use to make themselves into “dolls” that the public and producers can play with. 

            Anne, the character the novel spends the most time on, comes from a small town in Massachusetts and wants to have a career and independence first before she settles down.  She wants to get involved in the business part of showbusiness. When she first gets to New York City her first boyfriend, Allen Cooper, pressures her into agreeing to marry him.  Her boss and friends encourage it, because Allen is rich, good looking, and loves her, though his love smothers her.  It doesn’t matter that she doesn’t love him or that she wants to have a career first, because he is seen as a sure thing. The comfortable option and the option that makes the most sense for her according to everyone around her, except Anne herself.   Anne struggles to maintain her principles and stay true to who she is.  She barely manages to, compromising herself in small ways, but by the end she starts taking the addictive of pills they call “dolls”.  On the hand, Jennifer and Neely are in spotlight and suffer the corruption of Hollywood directly.  The intoxication of fame sucks the life out of Neely as she becomes a more narcissistic version of herself, who craves the attention of her fans. She is demanding of everyone’s attention, and it is never her fault. She ignores other people’s problems, assuming her problems are more important.   She becomes addicted to the pills they refer to as “dolls” and is constantly losing and gaining weight.  Jennifer is a people pleaser and is desperately lonely throughout her career. She is more together than Neely but still makes desperate choices to hold on to the life she has.  

            Through these ladies we see the monstrous machine that is show business and how it can challenge your integrity. Its fascinating watching as these women slowly destroy themselves through making immoral decisions and trying to hold on to hope they’ll have the lives they always wanted. The plot circumstances of our characters were in, they were often making the same mistakes making it frustrating to read at times.  I believe Jacqueline Susann was making the point that people often make the same mistakes no matter happen many times their loved ones try to help them.  It was very readable and immersive as the author wrote about the culture and nature of Hollywood and Broadway during this time. It might be a while before I reread this intense story about these women trying to make it in showbusiness. 

RIP Jacqueline Susann, you would’ve had a lot to say about Ozempic. It’s a nice read, goes on a bit too long, but it’s pretty focused in its interests and ideas which I appreciated. It also helped me ‘get’ the appeal of books set in a particular time or industry. I really felt like I was getting a behind the scenes look at Hollywood and its adjacencies in the 50s and 60s. The review on the back calling it “The Sexiest Novel of All Time” is dead dead dead dead wrong, but I blame that on publishers not knowing how to market books for, by, and about women.