In the Shadow of Greatness: Five Remarkable Women and the Men of Genius They Served Book

Alexandra Penney's memoir chronicles her experience losing her savings with Bernie Madoff. An ex-magazine Editor-in-Chief whose book How to Make Love to a Man was a New York Times best seller, Penney had seen her fair share of success. However, despite the years of hard work she put in for financial stability, her hopes for a happy retirement were dashed when Bernie Madoff's scamming came to light. The memoir opens as Penney is just finding out the news of his deceit and her suddenly precarious future. Going back a few years to describe how her "bag lady" fears of financial failure began as a small child, she continues the story of how they ironically materialized as she approached retirement.

I am going to be blunt: it is very hard to feel sorry for someone who says that no matter how destitute she becomes, she will never part with her maid. Speaking of her love for fine clothing, expensive dishes, and her Hermes bag, she is impossibly hard to relate to, especially with her endless rants of self-pity. She has to depend on friends to buy her meals at the Four Seasons! She has to barter to get her hair done professionally by her top-rate stylist! She has to sell her vacation home in Florida, and her son feels so sorry for her that he offers to let her stay in his guest house! When will the atrocities end?

Penney is perfectly capable of putting in a good day's work. She gave up her high-flying magazine job to become a photographer and painter, living off the royalties from her multiple books and commission from her art. However, her stubborn refusal to sell any of her pricey belongings or turn her art into a hobby again instead of her main source of income makes her future shaky and her story difficult to read without feeling angry at her bullheadedness.

Altogether, I thought the book was a joke. There weren't any real gems of wisdom hidden in this book, the story itself was rather lame (Penney didn't end the book much better of financially than she started it), and there was no real conclusion to the book. The only thing I found slightly interesting about the memoir was Penney's experience in the magazine publishing industry, but it was hard to tell how outdated her facts were. She did credit herself with the branding of the pink ribbon as the symbol for breast cancer awareness, which was an interesting story.

Overall, I wouldn't recommend this book to anyone…Despite calling herself a "bag lady," she gives up neither her apartment nor her artist's studio on Long Island, and her horrible destitution after "losing it all" is a heck of a lot better than the status quo I'm living in.