The Stylist Takes Manhattan
Page 34
P.S. Insights, Interviews & More . . .*
About the Author
* * *
Meet Rosie Nixon
About the Book
* * *
Behind the Book Essay
Read On
* * *
Eight Rules for Social Media Success
About the Author
Meet Rosie Nixon
ROSIE NIXON is an author and the editor in chief of the popular UK magazine HELLO!, where she has worked for the past eleven years. She has a love of all things celebrity, royal, and fashion-related. Rosie previously held senior positions at glossy women’s magazines, including Grazia, Glamour, and Red. In her career, she has been lucky enough to attend a multitude of glamorous award ceremonies, premieres, celebrity weddings, and showbiz events all around the world.
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About the Book
Behind the Book Essay
Dear Reader,
One of the reasons I love Amber Green so much is that she is kind. Sure, she makes mistakes and can often be impulsive, but her heart is in the right place—she genuinely sees the best in people and wants to make life better for them if she can.
I’ve been thinking about kindness a lot recently, and in my role at HELLO! magazine we launched a campaign called #HelloToKindness because we felt it so important to champion the simple act of being kind to others. Our campaign was particularly focused on the online world, where making unkind comments about the subjects of posts or making abusive comments toward other users has sadly become commonplace. This isn’t about silencing opinion or debate, it’s about thinking twice before you post. Some people seem to feel they can say things online that they would never dream of saying to a person’s face. We felt it was time to take a stand and say that this kind of behavior is not okay and has no place in our world.
Being kind is a way of life—it doesn’t cost any money, it’s within us all, whatever our background, and it underpins everything we humans are capable of doing.
We all remember someone who was kind to us. Whether it was a person who helped you at school, a friendly stranger who asked you how you were when you were having a bad day, or a friend or relative who simply listened when you needed to be heard. Can you remember how that kindness felt?
By showing kindness to Maurice Chan, Amber helps to bring his sparkle back; she sort of unlocks him from the anxiety and sadness he has suffered and helps to get his career and life back on track. Thanks to Amber, Maurice finds his mojo again, and it ends up benefiting Amber enormously in the process. That’s another great thing about kindness—you almost certainly get back what you put in.
Join the kindness movement and do something kind for someone today. You never know where that simple gesture might lead.
If you’ve enjoyed this novel, please style your copy of The Stylist Takes Manhattan and tag me on Instagram at @rosiejnixon—I love seeing your book posts.
With kindest regards and thanks for reading this,
Rosie
Read On
Eight Rules for Social Media Success
Amber Green learns the hard way that news travels fast in the online world, when one faux pas on Instagram nearly costs her a glittering New York career before it’s even begun. No one wants to become famous for a social media blunder. Here’s how to win likes, follows, and fans, without turning your life into an Insta-sham. . . .
Be authentic. It’s very hard to keep up for long a persona that isn’t the real you, so when curating your page, find your true voice and a photography style that captures the real you. Don’t be a copycat—be the dazzling original you are.
Don’t be afraid to balance moments when you’re clearly living your best life (that glamorous event, the new dress, the flashy vacation), with occasions when you’re not feeling quite so on top of the world. A makeup-free face with no filter or an honest post about a time you felt insecure will endear you to your fan base, and also sets a much healthier image for younger users. We shouldn’t have to live up to a beautiful, perfect ideal all the time, because that is not attainable or what life is really like. Be real!
Think twice before you post. I often think about whether I would stand up on a crowded subway train and say, “Hey, everyone, look at this photo and hear this story!” before I make it public. If you have the slightest feeling that you wouldn’t be proud showing that image to a packed room, or a niggle that a comment could come back to haunt you—stop right now. You’ll thank me very much.
Do you have teeth so white your friends need sunglasses when you smile? Skin as smooth as melted chocolate, and a waistline more waspish than a silver-screen icon? Get real, sister! Don’t go overboard with filters and photoshopping. It shows immediately and it’s tacky with a capital T. Be proud of your curves and celebrate your imperfections; don’t hide them away. You’re beautiful enough.
Block, unfriend, or report the haters! Some people just don’t have anything kind to say, and if you’re feeling the victim of a nasty troll or an online bully, don’t suffer in silence. Report them and tell someone about it. There are some great support services if you feel that online bullying is getting you down. See stopbullying.gov for starters. Sharing is everything.
Give credit where credit is due. No one warms to having their photo passed off as someone else’s, or their clever little comment requoted without it being attributed to the original author. Build your Instagram community by crediting the users and accounts you love. They’ll love you back, big time.
There is no need to post twenty times in one day. I love you, girlfriend, but I don’t need (or have the time) to see hundreds of selfies and what you ate for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and those snacks at eleven, three, and ten p.m. Curate your page as you would an art gallery—oversharing is not caring and you may lose followers quicker than you can say “selfie stick.”
Be kind. Above all, treat people the same in the online world as you would IRL (that’s In Real Life). It’s not acceptable to post abusive, racist, or sexist comments either aimed at the subject of a post or other users. If you wouldn’t say it to someone’s face, don’t say it at all. End of story.
Also by Rosie Nixon
The Stylist
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
P.S.™ is a trademark of HarperCollins Publishers.
THE STYLIST TAKES MANHATTAN. Copyright © 2017 by Rosie Nixon. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Originally published as Amber Green Takes Manhattan in Great Britain in 2017 by HQ, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers LTD.
FIRST U.S. EDITION
Title page illustration © bcdan / Shutterstock, Inc.
Cover design and illustration by Connie Gabbert
Digital Edition SEPTEMBER 2019 ISBN: 978-0-06-286391-1
Version 06292019
Print ISBN: 978-0-06-286390-4
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