cover image Mad Women: The Other Side of Life on Madison Avenue in the %E2%80%9860s and Beyond

Mad Women: The Other Side of Life on Madison Avenue in the %E2%80%9860s and Beyond

Jane Maas, read by Coleen Marlo. Tantor Media, unabridged, five CDs, 5.5 hrs., $34.99 ISBN 978-1-4526-0550-0

Riffing heavily on the hit television show Mad Men, Maas's book provides the female point of view of the advertising world of the 1960s%E2%80%94an environment both chaotic and stodgy. The author, who began her advertising career as a copywriter at Ogilvy & Mather and eventually ascended to become chairman of Earle Palmer Brown, tracks her trajectory and the observations she gathered along the way%E2%80%94about race, gender, and the difficulties reconciling a working life with a home life. Narrator Coleen Marlo reads Maas's text crisply and cleanly. She effectively creates distinctive voices for Maas's various co-workers and bosses. However, when reading Maas's prose%E2%80%94which at times can be a bit dry%E2%80%94Marlo occasionally sounds flat, but this is a minor flaw in an otherwise enjoyable performance. A Thomas Dunne hardcover. (Feb.)