Women’s magazines are still into recipes, except that instead of featuring apple pies, they focus on the ingredients for great sex. Here’s the lowdown on high hopes.
Glamour knows cold winter nights can bring more whoopie for lovers, but only if the guy gets truly honest in bed. The cover girl on the “Guy Issue” is the quirky and fetching actress Zooey Deschanel, who says she cares less what men think. But female readers apparently do care. The cover package offers up what 1,000-plus males think about their partners in bed and spill their sex bucket lists and fantasies about co-workers. If it helps, there’s a Q&A from a guy panel to help unravel puzzling male behavior, e.g., “Is my husband thinking about me when he masturbates?” Loads of diet programs and fashion spreads round out the package, along with a trove of beefcake guys.
New Cosmopolitan editor Joanna Coles has set about sexing up the female empowerment magazine and adding eyebrow-raising articles about the woman who married her gay best friend. And while few could imagine that Cosmo could get cheekier, British-born Coles, who arrived in September, has made it more shocking than ever. Editors have no fear, and, as with HBO hit “Girls,” there are simply no boundaries. Cosmo mixes its two favorite topics, sex and getting ahead at work, in a feature titled, “Sex on a Desk: Worth It?” It concludes “great sex is easier to find than a good job.” Women trying to stop themselves having sex on a first date are donning ugly Spanx as a deterrent.
If it’s sex you’re after, the January issue of Allure falls short. There are no “25 ways to please your man,” or “10 ways to look hot while shopping at Whole Foods” lists to be found here. The only sex advice is on how to look like a bikini pin-up girl using body bronzers and tousled hair. First of all, it’s January. Secondly, we are pretty sure these products will just leave us looking like a homeless woman with messy hair and dirt streaks on our face. Still, we loved the mag’s non-stop beauty and health stories, starting with a very timely piece on the pros and cons of the no-dairy, no-meat, no-gluten health craze. We were also inspired by the piece on how to look younger in 28 days, starting with sleep and blueberries.
Marie Claire has a rep for being cooler, hipper and more informative than most other girl magazines, and the February issue is no exception. We loved this issue’s “What I Love About Me” column, which takes a look at ladies on the street in Paris. Unfortunately, Marie Claire was surprisingly dry on the sex angle. Indeed, the cover promises model and reality TV star Heidi Klum will talk about sex and younger men. But the interview is a total letdown when Klum simply says that while younger guys are nicer to look at, she can’t see herself “waking up next to a 25-year-old.” Come on, lady! You’re rich. And a supermodel. Live a little.
New York may have the most neurotic people in the country. But, New York’s self-help issue seems like a tortured stretch. A very lengthy feature focuses on how changing your self is very hard because we do not know how a self works. How clever. Incidentally, New Yorkers are changing themselves every day, biking to work more and smoking and drinking less. We have to agree, though, with Bill Hader, who, in his seven secrets to becoming your best, said he has given up watching “The Walking Dead” after the mother died.
The New Yorker is all about urban planning. There is a pretty compelling cover story on how 40-year-old Israeli far-right politician Naftali Bennett is gaining popularity and forcing the prime minister to get tougher with Palestine in advance of the January elections. Yet, Bennett does not even wear a yarmulke. He quotes Seinfeld and his wife makes a mean creme brulée. Then there is the Norwegian firm that is re-planning Times Square so locals enjoy going there.
Time certainly considers New Jersey Governor Chris Christie “The Boss,” giving him a free pass in its cover story. While calling him America’s most popular politician, partially because of his response to Superstorm Sandy, it fails to examine his failures, including how NJ Transit made the disastrous decision to store trains in areas slammed by storm surges, leaving nearly a third of its fleet damaged in the Oct. 29 storm. In hindsight, the storm also makes you question Christie’s decision to kill the second rail tunnel between New Jersey and New York because he feared cost overruns. A feature about Americans adopting babies, in light of Russia’s decision to stop adoptions, focuses more on the personal profile and less about the real issues.