Cirrus@Austlit

'It is the sixties and times are changing. Hemlines are getting shorter, stockings are being discarded and women are doing it for themselves. At the advertising agency of Bofinger, Adams, Rawson & Keane, three women Desi, Bea and Isabel are making their way in a man's world. For them jingles and catchphrases are easy having a life outside the office is so much harder. Adulterous affairs, pining for an overseas love and being used to exact revenge on a former fiance all take their toll on these three fashionable women. But the changing social landscape means there are surprises in store and that love can be found in the most unexpected places.' (Publisher's blurb)

'Sydney, 1963. Three young women are taking on the world of advertising. Don Draper wouldn't stand a chance. And Marion knows ... she was there!

'Early sixties in Sydney. Women wear princess-line dresses, edge-to-edge duster coats, gloves, perfectly matched handbags and shoes and seamed stockings. They are defined by the vital statistics of their bust, waist and hip measurements and if they are over thirty they re over the hill. Kings Cross is bohemian, Paddington is pre-gentrified and the crowd at Beppi s and the Ozone charge their boozy lunches to job numbers.

'At the advertising agency Bofinger Adams Rawson & Keane, two talented women hold important creative roles. One, Bea, is a copywriter. The other, Desi, is a television producer. Because they are successful in their work and rewarded by it, few of their colleagues know how adept they are at mismanaging their private lives.

'Anxious to join this starred twosome is a young secretary named Stella, who embodies all the qualities for success ambition, dedication, energy, efficiency except creative talent. In its absence she relies on stealth, flattery and plagiarism, to walk, in her Jane Debster toe-peepers, all over the others in realising her ambition.

'She succeeds. At least, for a while ...' (From the publisher's website.)