BROOKE SHIELDS IS NOT ALLOWED TO GET OLD

The iconic former child star would like to change the narrative on “women of a certain age.”

“At fifty-nine, I’m the one making the calls in my life—not my mother or the media or Hollywood or my family—which is something I’ve never felt before.” Shields’ third memoir (her first two were about postpartum depression and her relationship with her mother) paints a three-dimensional portrait of a very real woman, with aspirations, problems, and points of pride that will feel relatable to her target audience. Though she is proud of her accomplishments, and of the 2023 Hulu documentary (Pretty Baby: Brooke Shields) that reviews them, she can be self-deprecating: “My whole life has been Brooke Brooke Brooke, and there’s been this image of me as larger than life, and to be honest it can be a lot. I get a little sick of me.” She is quite specific about her health issues, which include a grand mal seizure and a broken femur, but these stories are told in service of a point about taking the reins of one’s medical care. In a chapter called “More Than Just a Pretty Face,” she writes about taping her thighs to her Spanx to improve the appearance of her knees, though she’s well aware of the irony of railing against beauty standards she helped establish. In “What Could Have Been,” she laments the limitations of her career as an actress: She has no Oscars or Emmys, she compares her accomplishments negatively to those of Natalie Portman and Jennifer Lawrence, but she also admits that the “commodity aspect” of her celebrity has its upside, at least financially. To wit: her new postmenopausal hair care product line, hopefully more successful than the 1980s blow dryers she says are still stacked in her garage. Though the reliance on research sometimes veers into the silly—studies show women criticize themselves eight times a day!—and the pep talk aspect can be a bit much, Shields’ engaging candor generally saves the day.

Read the book, watch the movie, order the shampoo. A Brooke Shields festival!