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Sheer
Told over nine charged days, Sheer is the gripping tale of a controversial beauty mogul’s insatiable ambition and the slippery ground between empowerment and abuse of power.
It’s 2015 and Maxine Thomas, the founder and creative director of the cult makeup company Reveal, has just been suspended by her own Board for a scandalous transgression. Housebound in her New York City apartment, where she awaits the verdict on her future, Max recounts her version of the events that have brought her to this moment.
From her start as a precocious suburban child in the eighties to her decades as a workaholic visionary, Max proselytizes a sheer, dewy look—cosmetics through a female gaze—all while battling sexist investors, the whiplash of cultural change, and the mounting pressure to keep her sexuality a secret. But when Max’s story catches up to her present, she must contend with the cost of true transparency. Who has she become in her relentless pursuit of success? And what will happen if she loses it all?
It’s 2015 and Maxine Thomas, the founder and creative director of the cult makeup company Reveal, has just been suspended by her own Board for a scandalous transgression. Housebound in her New York City apartment, where she awaits the verdict on her future, Max recounts her version of the events that have brought her to this moment.
From her start as a precocious suburban child in the eighties to her decades as a workaholic visionary, Max proselytizes a sheer, dewy look—cosmetics through a female gaze—all while battling sexist investors, the whiplash of cultural change, and the mounting pressure to keep her sexuality a secret. But when Max’s story catches up to her present, she must contend with the cost of true transparency. Who has she become in her relentless pursuit of success? And what will happen if she loses it all?
300 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 13, 2026
75 people are currently reading
18592 people want to read
About the author
Vanessa Lawrence
2 books18 followersVanessa Lawrence is a writer, editor, and native New Yorker. For nearly two decades she covered the arts, fashion, beauty, design, and New York society as a staff writer for publications including Women’s Wear Daily and W Magazine. She has a BA in history from Yale University and an MFA in creative writing from Sarah Lawrence College. Ellipses is her debut novel.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 225 reviews
February 27, 2026
firstly, thank you to the publisher for an arc!
4.5 stars — whew, i absolutely blew through this audio! i was completely ensnared by the rise and fall of our fmc maxine and her cult makeup company reveal, through her very specific lense of female beauty.
sheer, in my opinion, would be the perfect limited series, considering the book takes place over the course of nine days (with many flashbacks, of course).
i listened to the audio on libby and the narrator was fantastic!
4.5 stars — whew, i absolutely blew through this audio! i was completely ensnared by the rise and fall of our fmc maxine and her cult makeup company reveal, through her very specific lense of female beauty.
sheer, in my opinion, would be the perfect limited series, considering the book takes place over the course of nine days (with many flashbacks, of course).
i listened to the audio on libby and the narrator was fantastic!
December 19, 2025
It is impossible to be an ambitious woman. Max is born in 1975 and is inspired to create a beauty brand at the age of 6. She starts doing makeup for women in high school, then during college she is able to secure an angel investor which alters her course forever. It’s a cult-following beauty brand, and cult stories never end well, so they?
The entire time she is closeted. The narrative spans Max’s life from age 6 to age 40. Interspersed with a 9 day period in 2015, we are learning the formative experiences for her building her brand.
This story was so engaging and so realistic that only 30% of the way through the story I started searching the author to see if she had experience at a female entrepreneur unicorn company. Surely she worked at Away, at Glossier?? This story is a deep dive in those types of stories, you can create a culture and create a monster. This is such a powerful story; you will find no heroes or villains. Max is a compelling character. She is so very real.
I am filing this as historical fiction. We do love to put a female entrepreneur on a pedestal and then knock her off of it.
This is a very nuanced story with so many layers. And I promise you won’t be able to put it down. When I was watching the Pee Wee Herman documentary I couldn’t help but think that if he wasn’t closeted, it may have played out differently. This may be true for this fictional story as well.
This is sure to be one of the best LitFic books of 2026.
Thanks to NetGalley and Dutton for the ARC. Book to be published January 12, 2026.
The entire time she is closeted. The narrative spans Max’s life from age 6 to age 40. Interspersed with a 9 day period in 2015, we are learning the formative experiences for her building her brand.
This story was so engaging and so realistic that only 30% of the way through the story I started searching the author to see if she had experience at a female entrepreneur unicorn company. Surely she worked at Away, at Glossier?? This story is a deep dive in those types of stories, you can create a culture and create a monster. This is such a powerful story; you will find no heroes or villains. Max is a compelling character. She is so very real.
I am filing this as historical fiction. We do love to put a female entrepreneur on a pedestal and then knock her off of it.
This is a very nuanced story with so many layers. And I promise you won’t be able to put it down. When I was watching the Pee Wee Herman documentary I couldn’t help but think that if he wasn’t closeted, it may have played out differently. This may be true for this fictional story as well.
This is sure to be one of the best LitFic books of 2026.
Thanks to NetGalley and Dutton for the ARC. Book to be published January 12, 2026.
January 23, 2026
It’s 2015, and Maxine is a Gen X success story. In the 90s and 2000s, she made headlines as the young founder of a trendy beauty brand. Her company, Reveal, was revolutionary for its light-touch products that showcased women’s natural beauty, and its edgy talking points, like the “post-orgasm glow” its cheek tint aims to create. But now the tides have shifted. Some sort of scandal has occurred, and the board is out for Maxine’s blood. As she waits to see if she’ll be ousted from the brand she founded, Maxine begins to write down her life story.
I really enjoyed this book. An aspect it absolutely nailed is the changing beauty and cultural trends from the 1980s until the mid-2010s. We see Maxine’s vision of natural beauty go from exciting and fresh to ho-hum, as the mid-2010s millennials embrace contoured everything. We also see how Maxine can go from fighting sexism to becoming a problematic boss, all while still thinking she’s in the right. Toward the end of the story, she becomes a bit of an unreliable narrator, and it’s a bit of a gut punch after rooting for her throughout the story…but it totally works. Most people who abuse their power were not born villainous, and neither was Maxine. She was shaped by the norms of her generation, the way she had to fight for success, and the corrupting power of wealth and privilege. She’s a complex character, and that’s what makes this book SO good. I definitely recommend it!
I really enjoyed this book. An aspect it absolutely nailed is the changing beauty and cultural trends from the 1980s until the mid-2010s. We see Maxine’s vision of natural beauty go from exciting and fresh to ho-hum, as the mid-2010s millennials embrace contoured everything. We also see how Maxine can go from fighting sexism to becoming a problematic boss, all while still thinking she’s in the right. Toward the end of the story, she becomes a bit of an unreliable narrator, and it’s a bit of a gut punch after rooting for her throughout the story…but it totally works. Most people who abuse their power were not born villainous, and neither was Maxine. She was shaped by the norms of her generation, the way she had to fight for success, and the corrupting power of wealth and privilege. She’s a complex character, and that’s what makes this book SO good. I definitely recommend it!
February 13, 2026
soo addicting
November 20, 2025
ARC for review. To be published January 13, 2026.
3 stars
Quite the page turner about the cosmetics industry. Maxine Thomas is in her Central Park West apartment spending nine days waiting to see whether she will be ousted from Reveal, the makeup company she founded as a college student which is now a major player in the industry. While she waits she reminisces about how she started and what went wrong.
Ultimately this was some decent fluff and a whole bunch of people taking advantage of each other. I enjoyed reading getting an insider’s look at the cosmetics business (if the way it’s portrayed here is at all accurate,) otherwise just a beach book.
3 stars
Quite the page turner about the cosmetics industry. Maxine Thomas is in her Central Park West apartment spending nine days waiting to see whether she will be ousted from Reveal, the makeup company she founded as a college student which is now a major player in the industry. While she waits she reminisces about how she started and what went wrong.
Ultimately this was some decent fluff and a whole bunch of people taking advantage of each other. I enjoyed reading getting an insider’s look at the cosmetics business (if the way it’s portrayed here is at all accurate,) otherwise just a beach book.
January 25, 2026
I loved this- if it had been published last year, definitely would have been included in my Year of Evil Women video.
Maxine Thomas is a closeted woman running a makeup empire, using her desire for other women as inspiration behind highlighters, glosses, lip balms, and other products. Told over nine days, we begin with Max being ousted from the company she founded and awaiting her fate. As we dive into her past, Lawrence paints a picture of a ruthlessly ambitious, emotionally closed off workaholic- Betty Draper as girlboss.
Max's frigid emotional landscape becomes a battlefield, and was some of my favorite writing in the book. Lawrence clearly is an expert when it comes to makeup and women, and her writing about color, desire, beauty, and clothing is top notch, in addition to the vivid portrait of New York in the nineties and early aughts (my favorite time period to read about as a NYC native).
I loved this book because it's obvious Max is delusional, and while Lawrence convincingly brings us into her inner world, a woman who does not see herself is a woman who does not know herself. The felling of the mogul is inevitable, and Lawrence tells a story of a woman brought low after being on top- the modern Icarus story, and one we've seen time and time again with about a dozen women from the original girlboss era. It's an interesting line to thread, and I really enjoyed reading this book.
Maxine Thomas is a closeted woman running a makeup empire, using her desire for other women as inspiration behind highlighters, glosses, lip balms, and other products. Told over nine days, we begin with Max being ousted from the company she founded and awaiting her fate. As we dive into her past, Lawrence paints a picture of a ruthlessly ambitious, emotionally closed off workaholic- Betty Draper as girlboss.
Max's frigid emotional landscape becomes a battlefield, and was some of my favorite writing in the book. Lawrence clearly is an expert when it comes to makeup and women, and her writing about color, desire, beauty, and clothing is top notch, in addition to the vivid portrait of New York in the nineties and early aughts (my favorite time period to read about as a NYC native).
I loved this book because it's obvious Max is delusional, and while Lawrence convincingly brings us into her inner world, a woman who does not see herself is a woman who does not know herself. The felling of the mogul is inevitable, and Lawrence tells a story of a woman brought low after being on top- the modern Icarus story, and one we've seen time and time again with about a dozen women from the original girlboss era. It's an interesting line to thread, and I really enjoyed reading this book.
September 10, 2025
I first started reading Sheer months ago, but I kept losing interest and moving to another book, and then coming back to finish a few chapters before getting distracted again.
I was drawn to this story because I love anything to do with the beauty industry, and this seemed like it would maybe take the form of an expose.
The writing format was in a sort of memoir-like style, and as a certified memoir lover that should have worked well for me. I think what held me back from loving this story was the cold way it was told. It was almost like reciting facts about a life that has no ties to the one telling it. It didn’t feel like she was recounting her own experiences, the authentic “voice” was noticeably missing.
The story itself was interesting to me, but it was hard to connect with what was happening when the writing style wasn’t clicking.
I think people who connect more with an actual plot would enjoy this, but for people like me who value characters emotional depth and storytelling… it might be a skip.
Thanks to NetGalley for a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
I was drawn to this story because I love anything to do with the beauty industry, and this seemed like it would maybe take the form of an expose.
The writing format was in a sort of memoir-like style, and as a certified memoir lover that should have worked well for me. I think what held me back from loving this story was the cold way it was told. It was almost like reciting facts about a life that has no ties to the one telling it. It didn’t feel like she was recounting her own experiences, the authentic “voice” was noticeably missing.
The story itself was interesting to me, but it was hard to connect with what was happening when the writing style wasn’t clicking.
I think people who connect more with an actual plot would enjoy this, but for people like me who value characters emotional depth and storytelling… it might be a skip.
Thanks to NetGalley for a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
October 20, 2025
2.5⭐️
Interesting...
"Sheer" tells the story of Maxine "Max", a beauty mogul on the brink of losing her cosmetic empire due to a scandal of immense proportions. Through flashbacks and recitations, she combs through how she came to this critical juncture; dissecting the past and questioning the future.
This had a lot of potential to be really interesting and thought-provoking. Going into this, I expected there to be a larger discussion of "cancel culture" or how dangerous social media can be, especially for women in power. Yet, I feel like there was something missing from this; some larger, grittier bit that would have pushed this over the edge.
What hurts this book the most, I fear, is the pacing. The aforementioned scandal does not become clear until the final chapters, and once it is, you begin to question all the history you waded through leading to that reveal. I'm all for suspense and creating tension, but at least give the reader some juicy tidbits to keep our interest going.
Even though the plot wasn't up to snuff, I will say the writing was pretty well done. There were actually some beautiful descriptive passages and good, poignant statements that helped keep me engaged. So, I'd say in this regard you have to take the meh with the good.
Overall, I'd say this was fine. It's not my cup of tea. Maybe others will enjoy it.
Thank you to NetGalley and Dutton for an ARC of this book!
Interesting...
"Sheer" tells the story of Maxine "Max", a beauty mogul on the brink of losing her cosmetic empire due to a scandal of immense proportions. Through flashbacks and recitations, she combs through how she came to this critical juncture; dissecting the past and questioning the future.
This had a lot of potential to be really interesting and thought-provoking. Going into this, I expected there to be a larger discussion of "cancel culture" or how dangerous social media can be, especially for women in power. Yet, I feel like there was something missing from this; some larger, grittier bit that would have pushed this over the edge.
What hurts this book the most, I fear, is the pacing. The aforementioned scandal does not become clear until the final chapters, and once it is, you begin to question all the history you waded through leading to that reveal. I'm all for suspense and creating tension, but at least give the reader some juicy tidbits to keep our interest going.
Even though the plot wasn't up to snuff, I will say the writing was pretty well done. There were actually some beautiful descriptive passages and good, poignant statements that helped keep me engaged. So, I'd say in this regard you have to take the meh with the good.
Overall, I'd say this was fine. It's not my cup of tea. Maybe others will enjoy it.
Thank you to NetGalley and Dutton for an ARC of this book!
February 17, 2026
I loved getting to see inside the cosmetics industry and I loved seeing Maxine use her femme identity as a lesbian as protection and a shield from a homophobic society. However this was pretty boring in a general sense, Maxine as our main character did not have a defined voice nor was she particularly compelling to read about.
February 9, 2026
In Sheer, Maxine works relentlessly to build her cosmetics company, Reveal, until she’s suspended by the board for her involvement in a corporate scandal.
We, as readers, are with Maxine for 9 agonizing days, as she awaits her fate. Maxine shares how she built the company as a young entrepreneur, the events that transpired, and what it means to be at the precipice of losing it all.
The main characters in Sheer were smart, though not necessarily likable. The insight into the competitive cosmetics industry and the need to meet evolving trends felt realistic. Ambition is a major theme of the story.
While I didn’t like all aspects of Sheer, I enjoyed several parts and found it to be a quick, entertaining read — 3.5 stars
We, as readers, are with Maxine for 9 agonizing days, as she awaits her fate. Maxine shares how she built the company as a young entrepreneur, the events that transpired, and what it means to be at the precipice of losing it all.
The main characters in Sheer were smart, though not necessarily likable. The insight into the competitive cosmetics industry and the need to meet evolving trends felt realistic. Ambition is a major theme of the story.
While I didn’t like all aspects of Sheer, I enjoyed several parts and found it to be a quick, entertaining read — 3.5 stars
March 27, 2026
the blurb sells this as a gripping tale expounding the complexities of misogyny, ambition, and (abuse of) power told over nine charged days, which is only true in the very technical sense that the main character spends nine days writing a very bad memoir while briefly checking in on her present day life and feeling sorry for herself. the "day x" chapters make up a banging 14% of this book, and sadly they're not very charged with anything other than self-indulgence and explanatory prose.
from the premise, you'd think that this book would have some level of nuance and subtlety. it does not. it could've been interesting to explore the rise and fall of a make-up mogul and her fraught position within a patriarchal capitalist society, but there's nothing enticing about the writing. it is boring, flat, direct, self-obsessed. it feels like a first draft. there's not a single line of dialogue in this entire book that feels like it was said by a human being. a random little example:
wow riveting where would we be without therapy speak. there are so many more, you can open on any random page and find bad dialogue.
anyway, from the start, we're not told why maxine is suspended by the board of the beauty company she founded. theoretically, this could build suspense (think: oh my god, what's up?! what has happened?! i need to keep reading to find out!) but her character isn't interesting enough to hook me into wondering what's going on. she sits down and starts typing her version of events which pretty much goes like this: i'm very rich and very skinny and very very beautiful and i've worked soooo hard to be rich and skinny and influential because i don't eat carbs and from a veeerryyy young age my mother read me vogue magazines instead of fairy tales and i immediately saw through the complex layers of misogyny and harmful beauty ideals in them so i've devoted my life to perpetuating them anyway because all other women are hideous and wear ugly makeup and instead they should wear MY makeup which will make them feel BEAUTIFUL. my company will never, ever launch a foundation because "women don't need foundation, it's the patriarchy that's made them feel that they do", but they do need the blush and highlighter that i invented because these products are "elixirs of confidence". and i'm the specialest little gay girl there ever was <3
so maxine is pretty clearly supposed to be a self-absorbed and delusional character. but even as a portrait of a narcissist, it is just....extremely boring to read. throughout most of the book i was thinking, "is this an unreliable narrator or is it just really bad writing?" and was mostly leaning towards the latter. maxine has a lot of self-important thoughts ala "This was the first of many moments when I realized that being exceptional is a lonely business" and just as many moments where she is demonstrably stupid (e.g. not even reading a contract before signing it?! hello? how are you RUNNING a fucking company?!) which clearly shows a large gap between physical reality and her impression of it. her impression: i'm the sexiest and smartest woman alive and i'm singlehandedly revolutionising the beauty industry. the reality: yeah probably not that. HOWEVER, the writing is so frustratingly simple and lacks any type of subtlety that it doesn't come across so much as "unrealiable narration" but instead "irritating narration".
there is no logical consistency to anything in this book. maxine simultaneously argues "if amanda wants a promotion, she needs to/would ask for one!" and "i can't sleep with her since she's about 25 years old and thus a CHILD" and "amanda is a criminal mastermind who over the course of several years seduced and forced me to be reliant on her in order to take me down." let's say that we accept she's delusional enough to simultaneously believe all of these things (fine!), how are we supposed to also believe that she created this company from scratch and made it so damn famous with all her feminist grit and commerce knowhow?
another case of logic collapsing: she must remain closeted or the company might be destroyed because of homophobia. this shows how she's sacrificing everything because she's so devoted to the success of her brand. fair enough. but she's also (off-page!) fucking her way through the entire lesbian population in nyc and this somehow sparks no rumours that her extremely famous self is not straight? yeah sure that makes sense. everything about this book makes so much fucking sense.
you think i'm done but i'm not. i don't know when i will be. before she drops out of college, she starts sleeping with an older woman. when this older woman finds out that she's still in college, she reacts like so: "If those women [her friends] find out you're only twenty, they'll kill me. You can't tell anyone. . . It's bad enough sneaking around; now I have to worry people will think you're a pedophile." ....did i get that right? people will think you're a pedophile because you're going out with a twenty-year-old college student? ok i guess. sure. but vanessa lawrence is committed to this idea! because later, when maxine herself is 40, she starts sleeping with amanda (early or mid 20s), and we get this puzzling gem: "what I gained from Amanda, what attracted me to her nubile shores, was not the sizzling heat of sex". clearly lawrence wants to expound on some complex nuanced point about age gaps and power dynamics but she's unfortunately also allergic to nuance and believes pedophilia is when you date an adult.
honestly this whole book just screams "i think i'm making a nuanced point about something" but it isn't! there's no nuance to be found anywhere and there's no subtlety to be found anywhere. i have nothing to do as a reader because every conclusion you're supposed to draw is spelled out in large neon letters. everything is explained to death. and yet it is somehow almost a mercy that this book primarily relies on telling rather than showing because any attempt at imagery is something like "her mouth was like a slightly deflated croissant" and "her face was pristine like a fresh bullet of lipstick". yay.
"Always happy to provide complexity," I say. and i personally ask: where.
then we get to the almost end and we finally get the big reveal of why the board suspended her and.........of course it doesn't really make a lot of sense because nothing in this book does. it's contrived. and it is somehow kind of rushed after all these hundreds of boring repetitive self-indulgent pages. and then we get a totally jarring and nonsensical switch to the second person to make sure that the ending is actually worse than everything leading up to it. are we supposed to believe that she's in love with amanda? nothing in this book is convincing.
not only is it unconvincing, but i find it cowardly. it's clear that lawrence wants to touch on several complex issues, but she flinches away from anything truly messy or grey zone adjacent because that might be """problematic""". she wants to address a moral dillemma of age differences in relationships, but all her younger characters are in their twenties. she wants to address a boss taking advantage of an employee, but that's not what she writes. there's a blinking neon red sign about amanda losing weight to "hint" that she's uncomfortable with the relationship, but otherwise we only see her willing and enthusiastic. and i get that this is filtered through maxine's pov, but there should still be signs, there should still be subtlety and nuance to convince us that the relationship is actually unequal and unhealthy, otherwise it's just bad writing. she wants to address callout culture and racism within the beauty industry, but maxine's revealed crime is so tame because i suppose anything darker or worse would make her bad and actively complicit and oh no she's supposed to be our victim here. this book lacks guts. if you want her to be a "complex character", let her do some bad things and not just think she's so damn visionary and beautiful.
i need to end this review but there's one more point i cannot neglect: as a teenager, maxine starts a nice little side gig of doing makeup for girls at school. when her mum finds out about this, she's like "You may as well be selling yourself. I have never been so disappointed in you, Maxine. This is not how I raised you to behave." (no i'm not paraphrasing, this is the actual dialogue.) because yes of course in line with the overall logic of this novel, doing someone's makeup is virtually the same as prostitution. i don't know how lawrence even came up with this but if it's some type of drug i wish i could have it if it would erase all memory of reading this book.
you might like this book if you are someone who uses AI to write your emails and grocery lists because you hate using your own brain. but if that's the case i don't know why you'd be reading books for leisure.
from the premise, you'd think that this book would have some level of nuance and subtlety. it does not. it could've been interesting to explore the rise and fall of a make-up mogul and her fraught position within a patriarchal capitalist society, but there's nothing enticing about the writing. it is boring, flat, direct, self-obsessed. it feels like a first draft. there's not a single line of dialogue in this entire book that feels like it was said by a human being. a random little example:
"Max, I care about you deeply. You know that."
"I'm sorry," I say. "I know. That was the stress talking."
wow riveting where would we be without therapy speak. there are so many more, you can open on any random page and find bad dialogue.
anyway, from the start, we're not told why maxine is suspended by the board of the beauty company she founded. theoretically, this could build suspense (think: oh my god, what's up?! what has happened?! i need to keep reading to find out!) but her character isn't interesting enough to hook me into wondering what's going on. she sits down and starts typing her version of events which pretty much goes like this: i'm very rich and very skinny and very very beautiful and i've worked soooo hard to be rich and skinny and influential because i don't eat carbs and from a veeerryyy young age my mother read me vogue magazines instead of fairy tales and i immediately saw through the complex layers of misogyny and harmful beauty ideals in them so i've devoted my life to perpetuating them anyway because all other women are hideous and wear ugly makeup and instead they should wear MY makeup which will make them feel BEAUTIFUL. my company will never, ever launch a foundation because "women don't need foundation, it's the patriarchy that's made them feel that they do", but they do need the blush and highlighter that i invented because these products are "elixirs of confidence". and i'm the specialest little gay girl there ever was <3
so maxine is pretty clearly supposed to be a self-absorbed and delusional character. but even as a portrait of a narcissist, it is just....extremely boring to read. throughout most of the book i was thinking, "is this an unreliable narrator or is it just really bad writing?" and was mostly leaning towards the latter. maxine has a lot of self-important thoughts ala "This was the first of many moments when I realized that being exceptional is a lonely business" and just as many moments where she is demonstrably stupid (e.g. not even reading a contract before signing it?! hello? how are you RUNNING a fucking company?!) which clearly shows a large gap between physical reality and her impression of it. her impression: i'm the sexiest and smartest woman alive and i'm singlehandedly revolutionising the beauty industry. the reality: yeah probably not that. HOWEVER, the writing is so frustratingly simple and lacks any type of subtlety that it doesn't come across so much as "unrealiable narration" but instead "irritating narration".
there is no logical consistency to anything in this book. maxine simultaneously argues "if amanda wants a promotion, she needs to/would ask for one!" and "i can't sleep with her since she's about 25 years old and thus a CHILD" and "amanda is a criminal mastermind who over the course of several years seduced and forced me to be reliant on her in order to take me down." let's say that we accept she's delusional enough to simultaneously believe all of these things (fine!), how are we supposed to also believe that she created this company from scratch and made it so damn famous with all her feminist grit and commerce knowhow?
another case of logic collapsing: she must remain closeted or the company might be destroyed because of homophobia. this shows how she's sacrificing everything because she's so devoted to the success of her brand. fair enough. but she's also (off-page!) fucking her way through the entire lesbian population in nyc and this somehow sparks no rumours that her extremely famous self is not straight? yeah sure that makes sense. everything about this book makes so much fucking sense.
you think i'm done but i'm not. i don't know when i will be. before she drops out of college, she starts sleeping with an older woman. when this older woman finds out that she's still in college, she reacts like so: "If those women [her friends] find out you're only twenty, they'll kill me. You can't tell anyone. . . It's bad enough sneaking around; now I have to worry people will think you're a pedophile." ....did i get that right? people will think you're a pedophile because you're going out with a twenty-year-old college student? ok i guess. sure. but vanessa lawrence is committed to this idea! because later, when maxine herself is 40, she starts sleeping with amanda (early or mid 20s), and we get this puzzling gem: "what I gained from Amanda, what attracted me to her nubile shores, was not the sizzling heat of sex". clearly lawrence wants to expound on some complex nuanced point about age gaps and power dynamics but she's unfortunately also allergic to nuance and believes pedophilia is when you date an adult.
honestly this whole book just screams "i think i'm making a nuanced point about something" but it isn't! there's no nuance to be found anywhere and there's no subtlety to be found anywhere. i have nothing to do as a reader because every conclusion you're supposed to draw is spelled out in large neon letters. everything is explained to death. and yet it is somehow almost a mercy that this book primarily relies on telling rather than showing because any attempt at imagery is something like "her mouth was like a slightly deflated croissant" and "her face was pristine like a fresh bullet of lipstick". yay.
"Always happy to provide complexity," I say. and i personally ask: where.
then we get to the almost end and we finally get the big reveal of why the board suspended her and.........of course it doesn't really make a lot of sense because nothing in this book does. it's contrived. and it is somehow kind of rushed after all these hundreds of boring repetitive self-indulgent pages. and then we get a totally jarring and nonsensical switch to the second person to make sure that the ending is actually worse than everything leading up to it. are we supposed to believe that she's in love with amanda? nothing in this book is convincing.
not only is it unconvincing, but i find it cowardly. it's clear that lawrence wants to touch on several complex issues, but she flinches away from anything truly messy or grey zone adjacent because that might be """problematic""". she wants to address a moral dillemma of age differences in relationships, but all her younger characters are in their twenties. she wants to address a boss taking advantage of an employee, but that's not what she writes. there's a blinking neon red sign about amanda losing weight to "hint" that she's uncomfortable with the relationship, but otherwise we only see her willing and enthusiastic. and i get that this is filtered through maxine's pov, but there should still be signs, there should still be subtlety and nuance to convince us that the relationship is actually unequal and unhealthy, otherwise it's just bad writing. she wants to address callout culture and racism within the beauty industry, but maxine's revealed crime is so tame because i suppose anything darker or worse would make her bad and actively complicit and oh no she's supposed to be our victim here. this book lacks guts. if you want her to be a "complex character", let her do some bad things and not just think she's so damn visionary and beautiful.
i need to end this review but there's one more point i cannot neglect: as a teenager, maxine starts a nice little side gig of doing makeup for girls at school. when her mum finds out about this, she's like "You may as well be selling yourself. I have never been so disappointed in you, Maxine. This is not how I raised you to behave." (no i'm not paraphrasing, this is the actual dialogue.) because yes of course in line with the overall logic of this novel, doing someone's makeup is virtually the same as prostitution. i don't know how lawrence even came up with this but if it's some type of drug i wish i could have it if it would erase all memory of reading this book.
you might like this book if you are someone who uses AI to write your emails and grocery lists because you hate using your own brain. but if that's the case i don't know why you'd be reading books for leisure.
April 14, 2026
This was honestly just a really enjoyable book. It was a great deep dive and commentary in how women are treated even in industries that are FOR women. That even when women are leading, their power is questioned and used. How that power can change quickly, how perspective leads us down paths we may not know we are even on. It was well written and beautifully done.
December 17, 2025
Sheer by Vanessa Lawrence unfolds like a fictional memoir, following Maxine as she recounts her rise from childhood ambition to the creation—and unraveling—of a cosmetics empire. As someone obsessed with all things beauty, I loved the behind the scenes look at building and maintaining a major cosmetics company; those details were fascinating and felt grounded and real. The novel has sharp, insightful commentary on women in business, womanhood, and the quiet, ever present misogyny that shapes success and failure. While the central reason for Maxine’s downfall is mostly withheld, it becomes clear if you’re paying attention, which I appreciated. That said, the ending ultimately felt lackluster to me, leaving too many questions unanswered and pulling some weight from an otherwise thoughtful, compelling read.
May 16, 2025
thank you NetGalley for this ARC!!
I actually really enjoyed this! though times have changed a lot since 2015, sadly a lot of the things regarding womanhood in this story are still true. I liked that the ending wasn’t the happy one that you’d expect. it ended on a more somber note which just reiterates the misogynistic issues highlighted throughout. the last 2 books I’ve read have had characters that lacked depth. Maxine was the total opposite. I felt like I KNEW her and felt all of what she was feeling. I also LOVEDDD the fictional autobiographical style that this had. similar to seven husbands in a way. this made me sad, angry, hopeful, and proud to be a woman all at the same time. STAND ON BUSINESS MAXINE!! 4/5!
I actually really enjoyed this! though times have changed a lot since 2015, sadly a lot of the things regarding womanhood in this story are still true. I liked that the ending wasn’t the happy one that you’d expect. it ended on a more somber note which just reiterates the misogynistic issues highlighted throughout. the last 2 books I’ve read have had characters that lacked depth. Maxine was the total opposite. I felt like I KNEW her and felt all of what she was feeling. I also LOVEDDD the fictional autobiographical style that this had. similar to seven husbands in a way. this made me sad, angry, hopeful, and proud to be a woman all at the same time. STAND ON BUSINESS MAXINE!! 4/5!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 8, 2025
I think when writing a pseudo-memoir, you have the opportunity to make it as sensational as your imagination allows. There was nothing sensational in here. I kept waiting for the juicy scandals, the jaw-dropping reveals, but they just never came. It was all very tame, and frankly a little boring.
January 21, 2026
Sheer's narrator, Maxine, is powerful, virile, judgmental, and deeply unreliable. In a narrative device similar to Nabokov's Lolita, Maxine, like Humbert Humbert, begins to unburden herself after an as-yet-unrevealed PR crisis involving her and Reveal, the cosmetics company that she founded. In what proves to be a quick, compulsive read, she discusses her origins and motivations, interspersed with present tense chapters detailing the nine days leading up to a Board Meeting that will determine her future in the beauty industry.
This book is tricky to review. Told entirely from Maxine's point of view, the weakness of the writing (clunky dialogue, a dearth of character development, occasionally purple prose, and barely-concealed plot devices) can be blamed--and based on this novel's smart structure, should be blamed--on Maxine herself. A narcissist, is it any wonder that most of the characters in her story play second fiddle to her own experiences?
Unfortunately, the narcissism goes both ways, displaying too few opportunities for self-reflection. By the time a plot twist that upends the narrative appears (in the final 10% of the book), many readers may have given up on Sheer. As an exercise in form and structure, this novel is brilliant, but the execution leaves something to be desired--perhaps the delicate satire that Nabokov employs to keep the reader from drowning in the muck and mire of Humbert's damning actions and unreliability. Maxine simply isn't likable or sympathetic enough to merit the second read that the scaffolding of this book deserves
Many thanks to NetGalley for the ARC.
This book is tricky to review. Told entirely from Maxine's point of view, the weakness of the writing (clunky dialogue, a dearth of character development, occasionally purple prose, and barely-concealed plot devices) can be blamed--and based on this novel's smart structure, should be blamed--on Maxine herself. A narcissist, is it any wonder that most of the characters in her story play second fiddle to her own experiences?
Unfortunately, the narcissism goes both ways, displaying too few opportunities for self-reflection. By the time a plot twist that upends the narrative appears (in the final 10% of the book), many readers may have given up on Sheer. As an exercise in form and structure, this novel is brilliant, but the execution leaves something to be desired--perhaps the delicate satire that Nabokov employs to keep the reader from drowning in the muck and mire of Humbert's damning actions and unreliability. Maxine simply isn't likable or sympathetic enough to merit the second read that the scaffolding of this book deserves
Many thanks to NetGalley for the ARC.
August 22, 2025
This book had me wanting to treat it like a business school case study while also questioning every makeup and skincare product I own. I loved how nuanced it was, it makes you wrestle with what it really takes to be successful (like in a big way). You know the main character has done something wrong, but the way she lays out her story makes you wonder if maybe she isn’t at fault. The push and pull of multiple timelines, and the way it exposes how messy accountability can get, had me glued to my kindle.
I did feel the ending was rushed. There’s so much more to explore in someone coming to terms with their actions. And honestly, it’s frustrating that a board full of rude, bigoted people gets to decide the fate of one singular bigoted person. It made me think about how tangled our culture of “accountability” has become. Cancel culture, power, who gets to judge…it’s messy. We can’t go back to the days when white men had everything handed to them, but I’m not sure the current system is fixing much either. At the end of the day, power still sits with the same groups. I don’t have the answers, but Vanessa Lawrence, you sure had me questioning a lot.
I loved getting this ARC copy in advance of the publishing date, I’m so curious to see the commentary when it does come out!
I did feel the ending was rushed. There’s so much more to explore in someone coming to terms with their actions. And honestly, it’s frustrating that a board full of rude, bigoted people gets to decide the fate of one singular bigoted person. It made me think about how tangled our culture of “accountability” has become. Cancel culture, power, who gets to judge…it’s messy. We can’t go back to the days when white men had everything handed to them, but I’m not sure the current system is fixing much either. At the end of the day, power still sits with the same groups. I don’t have the answers, but Vanessa Lawrence, you sure had me questioning a lot.
I loved getting this ARC copy in advance of the publishing date, I’m so curious to see the commentary when it does come out!
Read
March 22, 2026That was so insane! It read like a fanfic like where’s the polyvore link to their outfits and makeup looks
August 24, 2025
I was drawn to Sheer because of the premise; I thought following this ambitious, successful, probably flawed woman would be fascinating. Unfortunately, the style and structure of this book didn’t work for me.
The book is written like a memoir of the narrator, Max, recounting her early life and how she built her beauty brand. Despite this confessional format, I felt like the narrator was at arm’s length the entire time. She describes everything very coldly and clinically. Much of the book consists of telling the reader things instead of showing them. As the book develops, we see more how unreliable she is, but it almost feels like it doesn’t matter because her emotional experiences so rarely make it onto the page.
I liked seeing how a queer woman navigated her life in the 80s and 90s, though I would’ve liked to see more of Max’s feelings about being closeted and never being in a serious relationship. We don’t really know if she feels sad, conflicted, or totally okay about hiding her sexuality. Although she has a slew of hookups, most of these seem to have very little effect on her (aside from serving as inspiration for her business). Max rarely displays vulnerability in these pages, which is fine for crafting a caricature, less so in a literary novel aiming to explore the motivations and complexities of a businesswoman.
The author withholds the details of the inciting event until the very end, which frustrated me. We know that Max is facing a board vote that could remove her from the company, but we don’t know why or what led up to this. Personally, I didn’t enjoy waiting until the end to know the details, though some readers might be fine with this structure.
I received an ARC from Dutton via NetGalley for an honest review.
The book is written like a memoir of the narrator, Max, recounting her early life and how she built her beauty brand. Despite this confessional format, I felt like the narrator was at arm’s length the entire time. She describes everything very coldly and clinically. Much of the book consists of telling the reader things instead of showing them. As the book develops, we see more how unreliable she is, but it almost feels like it doesn’t matter because her emotional experiences so rarely make it onto the page.
I liked seeing how a queer woman navigated her life in the 80s and 90s, though I would’ve liked to see more of Max’s feelings about being closeted and never being in a serious relationship. We don’t really know if she feels sad, conflicted, or totally okay about hiding her sexuality. Although she has a slew of hookups, most of these seem to have very little effect on her (aside from serving as inspiration for her business). Max rarely displays vulnerability in these pages, which is fine for crafting a caricature, less so in a literary novel aiming to explore the motivations and complexities of a businesswoman.
The author withholds the details of the inciting event until the very end, which frustrated me. We know that Max is facing a board vote that could remove her from the company, but we don’t know why or what led up to this. Personally, I didn’t enjoy waiting until the end to know the details, though some readers might be fine with this structure.
I received an ARC from Dutton via NetGalley for an honest review.
May 9, 2025
tldr; a solid read, i enjoyed it a lot!
i started this thinking it would be similar to american psycho (for some reason, i think the concept of CEO-focused “thriller” put me in that headspace) but really, it’s about a woman who just let herself get manipulated by everyone who thought they were better than her because they were of a different status, and she let it happen because she thought it was what she earned/deserved. i thought this was a really interesting concept and i loved the way that it was told in a significantly more intimate way than a lot of other books that center around the themes that this did. i started out the book really disliking maxine because of the way that she spoke about her life and the people around her, but she’s really a study of nurture over nature. you can see just how much potential for emotion that she had basically ripped away from her because everyone in her life told her to shove it down.
Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to read this!!
i started this thinking it would be similar to american psycho (for some reason, i think the concept of CEO-focused “thriller” put me in that headspace) but really, it’s about a woman who just let herself get manipulated by everyone who thought they were better than her because they were of a different status, and she let it happen because she thought it was what she earned/deserved. i thought this was a really interesting concept and i loved the way that it was told in a significantly more intimate way than a lot of other books that center around the themes that this did. i started out the book really disliking maxine because of the way that she spoke about her life and the people around her, but she’s really a study of nurture over nature. you can see just how much potential for emotion that she had basically ripped away from her because everyone in her life told her to shove it down.
Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to read this!!
March 8, 2026
such bland and uninspired writing for a plot that seemed so interesting(?) I mean, millennial-undercover-lesbian-girl-boss-beauty founder/seductress loses EVERYTHING due to a hybridised racial-sexual exploit of younger employee… women’s stories matter! they just do! we’ve got a supposed business in tatters. scandal. sex IN the city. how did it all begin? how did we get here? I was expecting to be taken into this journey in scrutinous detail, in depth characterisation GALORE… and yet….The little in-between flashbacks to the present, whilst the story trudged on in the past, kind of did absolute nothing for me? Once the racial element was introduced, I was more engaged (as it had been slowly waning beforehand) but to no avail…racial fetish aside, it gets kind of predictable somewhere in the middle. And not a predictable that is warm and/or comforting, it’s very oh-okay-saw-this-coming-what-a-SURPRISE type. For me, anyway. The ending is boring, but I guess what really could have happened anyway? In a way, nothing happened throughout the whole book. Like, things Happened of course… but then in the grand scheme of it all, nothing REALLY happened once you realise where it’s going….
I have taken some things away from it though, despite it all:
a) there needs to be a distinct separation between inventors/creators/innovators and people who run the business of said creation! It’s not for everybody!!
b) the cries of cancel culture always kill me because it’s actually NOT real!! (but then again perhaps it was back then, and I’m just thinking of things from a current mindset? hm. perhaps)
I have taken some things away from it though, despite it all:
a) there needs to be a distinct separation between inventors/creators/innovators and people who run the business of said creation! It’s not for everybody!!
b) the cries of cancel culture always kill me because it’s actually NOT real!! (but then again perhaps it was back then, and I’m just thinking of things from a current mindset? hm. perhaps)
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 1, 2026
In the modern age of social media, visibility has become a form of currency, and authenticity a prized commodity. Modern institutions and markets reward those who can appear relatable and morally transparent – yet only within carefully curated boundaries. Vanessa Lawrence’s Sheer captures this increasingly apparent phenomenon, following Maxine Thomas, the founder and creative director of the cult beauty brand Reveal, as she navigates the costs of public scrutiny, corporate ambition, and personal concealment.
While Max is an unreliable narrator, her deeply flawed character makes this book compelling, forcing readers to grapple with the complexities of intersectionality across queerness, gender, race, and class. Her experiences feel especially relevant in today’s world of influencer culture, where personal identity is constantly curated, packaged, and marketed, and where brand deals promise that anyone can become the "ideal" version of themselves with the right product. Through Max, Sheer shows how authenticity, labor, and identity are not just personal - they are entangled with systems of profit and visibility, reminding us that the cost of being seen is often higher than we realize.
While Max is an unreliable narrator, her deeply flawed character makes this book compelling, forcing readers to grapple with the complexities of intersectionality across queerness, gender, race, and class. Her experiences feel especially relevant in today’s world of influencer culture, where personal identity is constantly curated, packaged, and marketed, and where brand deals promise that anyone can become the "ideal" version of themselves with the right product. Through Max, Sheer shows how authenticity, labor, and identity are not just personal - they are entangled with systems of profit and visibility, reminding us that the cost of being seen is often higher than we realize.
January 21, 2026
Thank you to NetGalley, author Vanessa Lawrence, and Penguin Group Dutton for providing me with a free ARC in exchange for my honest opinion!
I have really complicated feelings about this read-- so much so that I waited 5 days after I finished it to complete my review. For now, I'm sitting at a 2.5 rounded up to 3 rating. I was drawn in by the short book summary blurb, the cover, and the vibes that this seemed similar to a Glossier-type company fictional "tell all". It was truly a fictional memoir, one that took me a little bit to get into because you learn about Maxine's story/life as the book goes on, and obviously since she's fictional, I had zero prior knowledge at all. At first, I was wanting more of an established intro or story format vs diving right in to a fictional memoir, but once I caught on to the pacing, I was okay with it. By the end, I was invested in Maxine as a character and protagonist. She is a flawed character who makes lots of mistakes, some hard to read about and/or root for her. This doesn't necessarily fully impact my rating, but I do think I didn't connect with her as much as I was hoping because I found the pacing to drag on at times. I also thought her Gen X "girl boss" mindset was a bit grating at times and something I could have done without. I didn't realize this was going to be a queer story, and I think it was handled very interestingly. Some things I appreciated Lawrence shining a light on, such as the fact that Maxine had to stay closeted to succeed in that time, but I think she used her age/the time period to "justify" some harmful queer behaviors. Again, flawed character making flawed choices in a fictional story, so not the end of the world, but something that didn't always quite work for me. This was just a confusing book as a whole in the sense that to me, it both dragged and had me hooked, and I both disliked and rooted for Maxine. I don't regret reading it, but I do think it was a bit different than my expectations and not really something I'll be returning to.
I have really complicated feelings about this read-- so much so that I waited 5 days after I finished it to complete my review. For now, I'm sitting at a 2.5 rounded up to 3 rating. I was drawn in by the short book summary blurb, the cover, and the vibes that this seemed similar to a Glossier-type company fictional "tell all". It was truly a fictional memoir, one that took me a little bit to get into because you learn about Maxine's story/life as the book goes on, and obviously since she's fictional, I had zero prior knowledge at all. At first, I was wanting more of an established intro or story format vs diving right in to a fictional memoir, but once I caught on to the pacing, I was okay with it. By the end, I was invested in Maxine as a character and protagonist. She is a flawed character who makes lots of mistakes, some hard to read about and/or root for her. This doesn't necessarily fully impact my rating, but I do think I didn't connect with her as much as I was hoping because I found the pacing to drag on at times. I also thought her Gen X "girl boss" mindset was a bit grating at times and something I could have done without. I didn't realize this was going to be a queer story, and I think it was handled very interestingly. Some things I appreciated Lawrence shining a light on, such as the fact that Maxine had to stay closeted to succeed in that time, but I think she used her age/the time period to "justify" some harmful queer behaviors. Again, flawed character making flawed choices in a fictional story, so not the end of the world, but something that didn't always quite work for me. This was just a confusing book as a whole in the sense that to me, it both dragged and had me hooked, and I both disliked and rooted for Maxine. I don't regret reading it, but I do think it was a bit different than my expectations and not really something I'll be returning to.
February 26, 2026
Sheer proves that the beauty biz can get pretty ugly, but it certainly made for an entertaining read.
Our protagonist Maxine (Max) is an NYU dropout who follows her lifelong dream of creating a makeup brand, Reveal, with the help of wealthy Upper East Side donors and their inner circle. Along the way she encounters loneliness, ageism, sexism, and plenty of other hurdles (including her failed product, Whisper, to name just one).
Things get truly chaotic in 2015, the time period in the story in which Max is waiting to see if she will be ousted from the brand she founded after a major scandal…well, two. (No spoilers here.)
I love how the story shuffles between Max’s childhood and the present day (2015), showing us the brand’s evolution and cast of characters along the way. However, I feel as though some early parts of the novel focusing on her childhood/teen years could have been sped up.
This is definitely something I would recommend for a fun, juicy read — and you can get it done in a weekend. Definitely looking forward to seeing what Vanessa Lawrence is cooking up next. 💄
Our protagonist Maxine (Max) is an NYU dropout who follows her lifelong dream of creating a makeup brand, Reveal, with the help of wealthy Upper East Side donors and their inner circle. Along the way she encounters loneliness, ageism, sexism, and plenty of other hurdles (including her failed product, Whisper, to name just one).
Things get truly chaotic in 2015, the time period in the story in which Max is waiting to see if she will be ousted from the brand she founded after a major scandal…well, two. (No spoilers here.)
I love how the story shuffles between Max’s childhood and the present day (2015), showing us the brand’s evolution and cast of characters along the way. However, I feel as though some early parts of the novel focusing on her childhood/teen years could have been sped up.
This is definitely something I would recommend for a fun, juicy read — and you can get it done in a weekend. Definitely looking forward to seeing what Vanessa Lawrence is cooking up next. 💄
April 21, 2026
I have a lot of thoughts on this book. 1. be careful who you trust especially in the business world 2. If you are young or inexperienced and starting a new business, make sure you have a lawyer before signing any contracts. 3. don’t sleep with your assistant 4. Stay away from anything that even has the slightest chance of coming off racist even if approved by a board and PR team. How did no one catch that!? It was quite obvious.
April 27, 2026
Okay so I didn’t really hate this book at all! I felt like the story was super complex and provided a really interesting lens into the “golden handcuffs” of being a women in the corporate world, even if you created that world. I thought there were really great discussions about race and gender, how those proliferate over time. However, something about it all felt a little empty to me? I am not sure. Liked but defiantly did not love.
May 5, 2026
3.5 ★ rounded up because you either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain
February 27, 2026
Overall, I enjoyed this book. I read it in about 4 days and while the story didn't keep me feeling gripped with suspense or anything, I did look forward to each time of day when I was able to pick it up for a bit because I definitely kept wanting to get closer to finding out what the drama actually was regarding Reveal. Memoirs (and biographies) are my favorite type of reading material, so I really enjoyed how this was written in memoir-style and Max's backstory, etc. My one gripe would be that the ending felt a bit rushed and underwhelming. That being said, I'll still hold onto this one for a future re-read some day, which means I enjoyed it.
Want to Read
May 13, 2025oooh I'm intrigued!
January 19, 2026
I liked this book, but I think I preferred the author's debut, Ellipses. Most of this book is written as a memoir with some interstitials in present day, so there was a lack of voice sometimes. Most of the book is an info dump, but the scenes where Max shows pieces of her life were very strong. At times, this felt like I was reading a slew of Harvard Business School case studies on entrepreneurship. Max is a terrible person. Extremely unlikable, but this is appropriate for the genre. She reminds me a lot of Billie from Ellipses and I wonder if the author wanted to write more about Billie and ended up with Max. But I did enjoy this book and once i hit about 40% I couldn't put it down in anticipation to find out what Max did. A little anticlimactic and predictable, but felt appropriate.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for my copy.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for my copy.
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