Perfumes: The A-Z Guide

This is a comment I made to another review that I decided to post as a review as well.This is a brilliant, original, funny, thought provoking and informative book. At the time it was written there was nothing like it, and nothing surpasses it.I have learned far more from this book about scent, combinations of scent and the appreciation of them than I have from anything else I've encountered. It delighted me, and also instructed me on new and helpful ways to approach sensory evaluation in my work (wine). I absorbed more about approaching and categorizing sensory evaluation and bringing life, interest, precision and structure to it than I have from any number of oenology texts and professional articles. Not that most of those books or articles were bad, but that this book is that good.Yes, this is high level criticism from people who rank somewhere beyond "enthusiast" in their interest in the subject. What fascinates them, like what fascinates or delights most devotees of anything, goes well beyond what the majority of people would wish or need to know about the subject. Their encyclopedic knowledge, incisive writing and vast passion for the subject mean much more to me, however, than a paragraph of disclaimers about heat index, humidity, skin pH, age, the fact that you woke up grumpy and some sort of contrived "grading rubric" would.Also, I find them hilarious. Their positive reviews are rhapsodic, their negative ones, blistering - passion combined with piercing discernment.Honestly, I don't care what the mainstream world thinks of most perfumes. Give me the obsessive interests, strong opinions and vaulting enthusiasms of Luca Turin and Tania Sanchez over what some other reviewers seem to want - the po-faced seriousness and studied middle-of-the-road dullness and strained objectivity of a Consumer Reports article about perfume. If you're looking for The Consumer Reports Guide to Perfume and Fragrance, and little gray bubbles in columns, this isn't it.But how can a regular person benefit from such a work? Let's take an example nearly every American over a certain age knows. Siskel and Ebert. I think they were so successful at critiquing film for mainstream audiences because it was easy to get a sense of each critic's approach. You learned that you could trust their opinions, sometimes in a negative way. But they weren't just mainstream, they saw everything. They were film obsessives. That obsession sometimes helped some obscure movies find a wider audience, and encouraged millions of people to try some things they might have avoided otherwise, or to go watch an older masterpiece at home. This is the case for me with this book. It's pretty easy to spot where you and the reviewers will agree or disagree after a trip to the perfume counter, and then the book is more valuable still.Some critiques seem to suggest this book is for elitists, or the pretentious. I couldn't disagree more. Turin and Sanchez clearly believe perfume is a form of high art accessible to almost anybody. So if you're looking for something agreeable, solid, mainstream, and affordable they identify such products quite well. They heap praise on Old Spice, Stetson and Tommy Girl for example- that's pretty much the opposite of pretension to me. They mainly insist that whatever you wear, at any price point, be good. And they suggest, time and again, that price and enjoyability are rarely linked, except in the necessary expense of certain natural components. And they tell you who spends the money for "the good stuff" and who doesn't.Pretty much every technical criticism leveled against the book concerning both the subjective qualities and chemical difficulties of perfume analysis is acknowledged by the authors, by the way. In the end, you simply can't account for everything, for everyone, but with such a vast storehouse of reviews, with consistent voices, you can find a solid shared grounds for analysis quite easily in my opinion. Which is sort of the point of expert analysis and critique, really.There is also a line of criticism here that runs along the lines of "But I can just read stuff on the internet about this, it's the same. It's just like, someone's opinion, man." So, art criticism has an element of subjectivity to it. Who knew?That criticism entirely misses the point. The point is finding true experts who voices you trust. Sure, that trusted advice certainly could come from an online community. When I need a medical diagnosis, or financial advice, I trust the random collection of experts I find on the internet. Opinions are just opinions. Why would you ask a doctor what her opinion is when you can just ask the internet? Why read a PhD who theorized an entirely new, and quite possibly correct, mechanism for scent when it's just, like, his opinion man?The main trouble to me is that dozens of new perfumes are introduced every year. The book will fall ever further behind on new releases, and things that are being aggressively marketed until there is a new edition. But that's small potatoes to me. Almost all the greats, and classics they talk about are available to try somewhere, even via an internet sampler. That's where to start anyway, to learn how this stuff works, and how to translate the words into scents.(Finally the critiques of various other critics are sort of hilarious - "How can he rate this five stars when I absolutely hated it! Worthless!" )

I'm older now, and I have a little more disposable income (and a lot more self-confidence), so I have had great fun using this book's witty reviews to guide me in trying and purchasing perfumes. I never had more than one or two bottles of perfume on my vanity table before. Now I have several dozen because this book has made me see perfume in a whole new way.Yes, the book is a delight to read, but I have found it much more fun to actually use. Interestingly, I discovered just how interactive this book can be because I am a book lover.I was intrigued by the book's description of a perfume by L'Artisan Parfumeur called Dzing! The authors likened the perfume's scent to a "secondhand bookstore." I purchased a bottle on a whim when I happened across it on a trip to New York. It was only when I was browsing at my favorite used bookstore days later that it struck me. The vanilla overtones in this fabulous scent do indeed evoke the wonderful aroma of old paper. I smelled my wrist, I sniffed the terrific, familiar book-laden air around me, I felt a happy sense of discovery and I was hooked.Since reading this book, I have stuck it into my tote whenever I plan to be in a major department store. The book's vignettes ignite my curiosity and imagination.Take, for example, Thierry Mugler's Angel. The authors deem this scent a masterpiece. They tell the reader the history behind the scent -- that it started as a joke which combined the elements of a masculine and a feminine fragrance, but that in making that joke the perfumer came up with a truly new kind of scent. The authors point out that Angel exists in a "high energy state of contradiction. Many perfumes are beautiful or pleasant, but how many are exciting?" Then the authors deliver the zinger, which gives me a mental image for placing the perfume into my own life context. They say that Angel evokes that " woman in a film who seethes "He's so annoying!" and marries him in the end." I got that! I could then smell the contradiction and the attraction in the scent. I purchased a bottle because the scent now "speaks" to me in a way it never could have before I read this book.Is perfume necessary to my existence? No. When my children were small and we had meager time, money or energy, perfume was simply that handy bottle of Chanel No. 5 my mother had sent me for Christmas which I sprayed on to feel pretty on those infrequent dinner/movie dates with my husband (when we could get a babysitter.) Do I agree with everything the authors say about the various perfumes? No, but that's part of the fun.This book has opened a pleasant door for me. Perfume has become a fascinating foray into sensual exploration. I enjoy reading the metaphors and similes, the creative adjectives and backstories describing these perfumes, and then experimenting with the truth of them for myself.The authors have done something wonderful with this book. They have taken the mystique which advertising has always made sure surrounded fragrance and swept it away. But they have replaced that mystique with something better -- little personalities, if you will, for the different scents. Now browsing at the perfume counter has become like attending a cocktail party filled with famous people. Some will speak to you immediately. Some will stand back, but become friendly if you approach. Some are dull as dishwater. Some you will dislike. But being an insider at the party is exciting. I love that I have an invitation.