Honestly, I couldn't finish this one. I could barely start it. I held onto it and tried various times-even using my kindle and a paper copy-but I didn't like it. I like the premise, just not the actual book. Maybe I will try again with the audio one day, but for now, I am officially quitting.

I don’t know what I was expecting, but that sure bummed me out. In general, I guess I’m very hit and miss when it comes to memoirs.

An engaging read which combines Ms Rowbottom's family history with the phenomena that is Jello. We learn about the science, and commercial history of the product and how the marketing of it changed with the roles of women over the decades. We can understand more about how gender is marketed to us when we learn both stories together.

Long memoir about the family that bought the patent to Jell-O. This book is very depressing and would have been a much better read if it was shorter. You get it early on that the family experienced a lot of tragedy, but to keep repeating it took away from the book. Thanks to NetGalley, the author and the publisher for the ARC of this book. Although I received the book in this manner, it did not affect my opinion of this book nor my review.

I heard about this book on a couple of different book podcasts and was delighted to see that it was still available as an ARC on NetGalley. I immediately started reading it and then... about a month passed. This book just didn't capture me like I thought it would. A history of the family behind Jello, one that is cursed? Cool. But, tbh, even with the Jello hook, this book just didn't capture my imagination. I did slog through it but it took a long time.

Two stars
This book came out July 24
ARC kindly provided by NetGalley

Where to begin. As the book, ostensibly, is billed as a memoir, I'll begin with the author's lineage.

In the beginning, Benjamin Hartwell "begat" two lovely daughters, Clara and Edith. Clara would grow up to become our author, Allie Rowbottom's great-grandmother. Edith would become the heiress of a huge Jello fortune after marrying into the Woodward family and surviving her husband, Ernest.

Ernest's story begins with his father, a man with a fancy name of Orator F. Woodward. who spawned six children and supported his family as a manufacturer and selling of a variety of items that included composition balls used by marksmen in target practice. The family lived in the small town of LeRoy, New York where in 1897, a local carpenter somehow discovered a way to make horses hoofs and bones into a tasty fruit flavored dessert labeled Jello. Lacking the wherewithal to market his product, he sold it in 1899 to Orator Woodward who successfully marketed the product into a household name and, in turn, made the Woodwards another newly minted American "nouveau riche" family. The Woodward clan did great things for the town. Their fingers were in every pie from schools, churches to library trust funds, restaurants to factory work.

Clara's granddaughter, Mary Edith Fussell had a rough childhood; not because of poverty, access to money not a problem. Her mother, Midge, was not a warm and nurturing mother; unsettled and uncomfortable as a woman stifled in world controlled by powerful men. A woman who would have preferred to be a writer to birthing children. Midge dies of breast cancer when Mary Edith was fourteen-years-old leaving her fearful of living under the same cloud as her mother; doomed to a life dictated by "the family curse", just as her mother had predicted. A curse with as many negative spells as Medusa has snakes. She felt she had seen the curse take her mother when she was a young girl, feared for her own life and feared for the future of her daughter, Allie. She tried to outrun the curse through drugs, drink, sex, and obsession with witchcraft. Always searching for the elusive need to feel loved and wanted in a patriarchal society. Swallowing emotions, repressing and silencing her womanly voice bringing on illness of mind and body.

"The curse...It was used to explain all manner of familial misfortune. Death, alcoholism, wealth and the existential boredom it brought with it. It was, she was told, confined to men and therefore nothing for to worry [her pretty little head about]. Later she would understand...the curse wasn't confined to men; it came from them, from a social structure predicated on their power. The curse was the silence impressed upon her...and countless women before.." - (Allie Rowbottom)

Mary's story was very much overshadowed by several other themes -the history of Jello and its impact financially and socially on the township of Le Roy. The sweet wiggly product was examined intensely for its marketing and ad campaigns that Rowbottom feels strengthened the patriarchal power and depicted what should be the aspirational goal of every women hoping to please her man at the same time attempting to stay relevant through wars and changing societal norms.

If the intense coverage of Jello didn't smother Mary Edith's life, Rowbottom tosses in a mysterious "Tourette Syndrome" like illness that befalls LeRoy teen girls in 2011, plays a recurring part; the impression left that these girls, like girls before them, are caught in the tangled web cast by a patriarchal society. Some thin thread alludes to Mary and Allie's affiliation with the girl's problems.

In the end, I felt like I was searching through a thick stew to see Mary Edith. There was one scene that physically made me sit back and say...What the? One of Mary's heartbreaking issues had affected me emotionally. At the chapter's end I flipped the page to an abrupt change of subject discussing the redesign of the Jello box.

There was no joy, happiness or sense that anything other than doom and gloom follows the inheritors of the great Jello fortune. I never really connected to Mary, Midge or Allie or their assertion that money was at the heart of their problems. Their curse.

Thank you, NetGalley, for the ARC copy in exchange for my honest opinion.

Hello Girls is an enthralling memoir which tells the story of the women who made up the history of Jello.
In the history that is unravelled, we learn that Allie's mother, Mary, was diagnosed with the same incurable cancer, a disease that had also claimed her own mother's life. Mary, however, is ready to combat what she considers the "Jello Curse.”
Before she dies in 2015, Mary sends Allie boxes of her research and notes, in the hope that her daughter might write the story that she could not tell herself.
I spent much of my time in this book with google open googling past Jello ads and recipes. A good mix of product history and family memoir.

*I received an advanced readers copy of this book in exchange for an honest review

Who knew that Jell-O—the squishy, jiggly dessert offered in half a dozen stained-glass colors—had such a dark history? That it is linked to the destruction of a family, the decline of a town, and the domestic containment of American women?

These are the intertwined stories told by Allie Rowbottom in her new history/memoir, Jell-O Girls. Rowbottom is a descendant of the Jell-O fortune (a distant uncle bought the patent cheap in 1899, then sold it decades later for a mind-boggling amount), but also an heir to what her mother, Mary, considered the Jell-O curse. Mary’s family was the wealthiest in LeRoy, New York, home to the Jell-O factory (until it moved away in 1964, setting off LeRoy’s decline), but their money either could not prevent or was the root cause of considerable darkness: alcoholism, sexual abuse, suicide, psychosis, cancer. Mary blamed Jell-O for all of this, viewing the product as a tool of the patriarchy—a light, pliable substance that taught the women who made it that they, too, should be equally easy to mold.

Jell-O as a representation of the blithe domesticity of the 1950s is a familiar trope in feminist writing, but Rowbottom delves much deeper into the brand’s history and the female-targeted ads it produced (unfortunately, none of them reprinted in the book). Her cultural history of Jell-O is both fascinating and cutting, such as in this analysis of the postwar cookbooks produced by the company:

It was not uncommon to see chicken or tuna disguised by mayo, congealed with Jell-O, then shaped into the specter of the animal from which it originated. Consumers wanted the shadow of a thing, cleaner somehow in its transparency, but not the thing itself (p. 47).



Rowbottom’s chief focus is how the Jell-O curse has affected three generations of women in her family—Midge (her grandmother), Mary, and herself. Midge gave up dreams of being a journalist to retreat into her family’s expectations that she become a wife and mother, roles that she found stifling. Midge died of breast cancer when Mary was 14, and Mary, unable to talk about her mother’s death, quickly found herself unmoored, retreating into a haze of alcohol, drugs, and sex before changing course after a long stay in a psychiatric facility. She emerged to find solace in a quiet life as an artist, giving birth to Allie after her 40th birthday, but only a few years later began to suffer from unusual symptoms that a parade of male physicians failed to diagnose. Finally, Mary talked a sympathetic female doctor into performing exploratory surgery, which revealed a rare cancer and set off years of treatment and remission until the disease finally devoured her in 2015. At the same time, Allie disappeared into an eating disorder, frequently consuming nothing but sugar-free Jell-O. Jell-O Girls is often a harrowing read, especially the final third, when Allie writes in detail about the stark, often messy, realities of serving as caregiver for her dying mother and the conflicting emotions this experience raised.

The one question I couldn’t quite tease out an answer to is whether or not there is any room for nature over nurture in Rowbottom’s evaluation of the Jell-O curse. Yes, the lives of women in her family were shaped, to a significant extent, by both external societal forces and the expectations of those forces that they internalized. But what about brain chemistry and neural networks? Can generations of illness really be attributed to patriarchy, or is there a deeper root cause of the family’s problems—namely, genetics?

This nagging question aside, I found Jell-O Girls an extraordinary, if often distressing, book. Rowbottom weaves together a remarkable number of narrative threads in a relatively low page count, considering the wealth of material she had to work with. And if there truly is a Jell-O curse, I sincerely hope that writing Jell-O Girls helps Rowbottom exorcise it.

JELL-O GIRLS by Allie Rowbottom is a strange, confusing memoir. Rather than providing a well-researched social history with a focus on a classic American company, Rowbottom whines about her family's privilege (her great-great-great uncle bought the patent in 1899) and a resulting curse. She chronicles instances of alcoholism, mental instability and her own mother's cancer diagnosis and then appears to shift blame to the patriarchy – even citing Bill Cosby (a former Jell-O spokesman) and his actions in support of her points. As I said, a confusing text that provides a family history of sorts, but is perhaps more an effort by the author at exorcism (yes, there is reference to the occult and witchcraft). Despite a starred review from Library Journal, this non-fiction work seemed out of balance. The best parts focused on the company and consumerism; the ads alone for Jell-O offer an amazing commentary on life and changing social mores in the US. If you want a "taste" of the book and its many messages, read the author's own words in this Vanity Fair article and then decide if you are hungry for more.
Article Link:
https://www.vanityfair.com/style/2018/07/the-jell-o-family-curse

I really wanted to like this book and to a large extent I did. I think with the proper editing it could have been a smashing memoir, but it needed to be broken down into three distinctive sections: the personal story, the corporate story, and perhaps even a third section with the advertising, because that alone- with pictures included- told its own special story. There seemed to be too much going on and just as my interest was piqued with one part, the next chapter would start with something different entirely. I felt bounced around and it's hard to maintain my interest that way. Overall though, it's a fascinating look at the Jell-O corporate history and how it molded itself to fit America's culture (no pun intended...ok, maybe a little one!) and an interesting look at the family who made Jell-O an American icon. Thanks for the read,
#JelloGirls #NetGalley

This is an interesting slice of American food history. When I was little, I loved to eat and look at the layered Jell-o desserts that relatives made. The layering seemed magical. I still have a weakness for the one with pretzels in strawberry Jell-o!

The concept of this book was very attractive to me. I really wanted to like this book, but somehow this book fell flat for me. This book seems disjointed in parts, and follows a lot of threads, and can be difficult to follow at times. I caught myself going back to see if I had missed something, or to try to figure out how the author “got there”.

The book is a  memoir about the family who bought Jello-O patent & became ridiculously wealthy as a result. In 1899, the author's great-great-great-uncle bought the patent for $450 and it changed the family’s trajectory in social and wealth status. But, as the author attempts to tell us, with the change of social status came what she is calling the "Jell-O curse" which has followed the family for generations. There are mysterious illnesses throughout the family and in the factory making Jell-O. There was a lot of detail about hospitalizations, which was long winded, in my opinion. A bit of editing may have helped with this section.

Overall, I guess this is an interesting look at an American staple for most of us growing up in the 1960’s. It seems like a lot of these uber rich families have issues, just like the rest of us, except they have much more privilege and access to health care. Oops. Maybe I just need to stop reading books that have a thread of whininess through them.

Thank you to the publisher and #NetGalley for a pre-publication ebook in exchange for an honest review.

I really wanted to like this book, but I think I was hoping for more of a history of the family and the company over the direction the author chose to take. The strongest part of the book, in my opinion, is the history of Jell-O and what family history is told. .This book follows a lot of threads, so much so that it comes across as disjointed and can be difficult to follow at times It feels weighted down by the heavy-handed and unconvincing connections the author draws between the family troubles and wealth and patriarchy. The curse results in mental and physical illness, alcoholism, and aimlessness in life, but those hardships are not unique to this family, so it can be difficult to understand why the author finds this curse unique. The story gets lost in the author's unsubtle attempts at descriptive language, so much so that it distracts from the figures in the book.

This is a unique memoir about the family who bought Jello-O patent & became fab rich and the mysterious ailments that plague them. In 1899, the author's great-great-great-uncle bought the patent for $450 and it changed their family dynamic forever, as it made them rich beyond their dreams. But with the change of social status came the the "Jell-O curse" which has followed the family for generations, and which the author's mother has been trying to write about for years. What is the curse? Readers will have to discover that for themselves. But to label this book "just a memoir" is a disservice, as it's so much more. Author Allie Rowbottom also follows the history of processed food, (like Jell-O) to show how it untethered women from the drudgery of food preparation and allowed them to pursue their own goals. It's especially fascinating to read how marketing campaigns for Jell-O changed over the years as society changed. This is a wonderful memoir of food, family, wealth and society.

Many of the early reviews of The Jell-O Girls describe it as a feminist book. I wish I could see it that way, but I don't. There are several stories here fighting for attention in The Jell-O Girls. The one that takes up the most space is that of the author, her mother, and her grandmother, all heirs to the Jell-O fortune. In addition to the triple biography, there's the company history of Jell-O and the social history of how Jell-O was received and how it has been used and adapted over the years. That was pretty interesting, especially in the analysis of the advertising for Jell-O. And finally, there was a third story about a group of schoolgirls in 2009 near the Jell-O factory, who came down with odd medical symptoms that could not be explained other than the usual cop-out of "mass hysteria." I found this the least compelling of the threads.

In the memoir/biography sections, the author was trying to address a family myth about a curse that afflicts the Jell-O men. She set out to show that the curse was also, or perhaps only, on the Jell-O women. The curse seemed to be poor health as well as the burden of too much money and not enough purpose. It's hard to see how these afflictions were unique to Jell-O heirs, since many people have poor health or lack purpose in life. Rowbottom decided that the curse was actually patriarchy. The women in the family were held back by the men. Well, once again, this hardly seems unique to Jell-O heirs.

So, a mixed bag with some parts more interesting than others.

(Thanks to NetGalley and Little, Brown & Company for a digital review copy.)

As soon as I saw the cover and blurb for this book, I wanted to read it. A book that let’s us in on three generations of JELL-O girls, wow! The author her mother, and her grandmother’s stories sounded like a dazzling read to me. Who doesn’t have memories of JELL-O and family? An emblem of home, “America’s Favorite Dessert” has been loved as a salad, snack, and of course, JELL-O shots. And so I eagerly dove in to this memoir or “memwah” as the author’s mother called it.

There are three main points to the book: the history of JELL-O, the curse, and the illnesses of the author’s family. The most interesting part for me was the story of the founding of JELL-O. Bought by her mother’s great-great-great uncle for $450 in 1899 and sold twenty-six years later for $67 million, JELL-O has been linking generations of families for 120 years. We think we know all about marketing now, with the influence of the internet, but JELL-O owed it’s early success to creative marketing.

The lightness and color of JELL-O is hidden in the remaining parts of the book. The second main part of the book details the sickenesses of all three of the “girls”. Both the author’s mother and grandmother had long, agonizing battles with serious illnesses. Their hospitalizations, treatments and deaths are graphically described. This part was hard for me to read. (There’s an irony, too- they experienced a lot of JELL-O on their hospital food trays.)

The third point is about the JELL-O curse. The author’s mother spent years writing about her life in an attempt to save herself from the family curse- how JELL-O had made her silent in the face of patriarchy. I did not understand this part at all.

The author’s mother remembered how she had admired the women she encountered in Europe- their passion and outward emotions which she saw as such a contrast to passive American women who lived only to please their family. But didn’t those same vibrant Italian women go home and create marvelous meals and memories for their families?

Overall, this is an interesting look at an American icon. And the author’s love for her mother and her desire to help her shone through the book. While this is a hard book to read in places, and puzzling too, it gave me plenty to think about.

Many thanks to Netgalley and Little, Brown and Company for an ARC.