Dish and Tell: Life, Love, and Secrets - Hardcover

San Pedro, Patricia; San Roman, Annie; Fuller, Tammi Leader; Rosenberg, Sara; Sacasa, Lydia; Soler-Martinez, Mercedes

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0060777710 ISBN 13: 9780060777715

Publisher: William Morrow, 2005

Synopsis

We see you, stealing a glance at these
pages during your lunch break, in between
errands while the world is calling on your
cell phone and you pretend not to hear.
We understand because we’re just like you.

Six dynamic everyday divas, the self-proclaimed Miami Bombshells, gather every few weeks to kick off their power pumps, drink wine, gorge themselves on chocolate, and dish about the costs of having it all (or not): husbands or lovers, children, money, power, spirituality, and successful, rewarding careers.

During these sessions -- guiltily crammed in between business trips, charity events, and their children's activities -- they drop all pretenses and let fly their most personal bombshells, which eventually landed on the pages of this book. All of the stories are true. Some are signed, others are written anonymously, to protect the innocent (and the guilty).

Long ago, the Miami Bombshells refused to accept lives of quiet desperation, deciding instead to embrace their imperfections and put their own needs at the top of their to-do lists. In doing so, they redefine what it means to be a modern-day bombshell ... it's more about being courageous than curvaceous.

These six brave women divulge their vulnerabilities and most intimate secrets by hanging their dirty laundry on this literary clothesline. They describe coping with depression when expected to be the life of the party, why they fell into dubious relationships, how they dealt with rape, panic attacks, romantic email blunders, hair loss, the corporate vs. family juggling act, and nanny nightmares.

All women, no matter how different, go through similar experiences in life, and just knowing that is sometimes enough to make it better.Dish & Tell proves that reality is stranger (and much more interesting) than fiction.

About this title

About the Authors

The "Miami Bombshells" are:

Patricia San Pedro: the original bombshell, who brought the other 5 together. She runs a very successful PR firm in Miami.

Annie San Roman: a school psychologist who works with troubled teens and has turned around many a violent and hopeless kid. Also a devoted wife and mother.

Tammi Leader Fuller: is a producer for NBC's "The Today Show", Fox TV, "Extra", "America's Most Wanted" and others.

Lydia Sacasa: successful banker who works seventy hour weeks and is obsessed with cooking, designer clothes and being a good mother to her three children...even if that means staying up till 6 a.m. to make homemade costumes for the school play!

Sara Rosenberg: this power player travels the world speaking to publishing groups about innovation and change.

Mercedes Soler: one of the most influential Latina newscasters, more recognizable among Hispanics in the U.S. than Oprah. She's a five time Emmy award winning newscaster for Univision.

The original "Miami Bombshell", who brought them all together, Patricia is a three-time Emmy award-winning producer and media executive who now runs a successful marketing and PR firm. She has 12,000 people in her contact list, making her the most "connected" Bombshell. She's a spiritual being, who believes everything happens for a reason. Patricia is childless, single and loving every minute of life.

Naturally blonde and blue-eyed Annie is a school Psychologist who worked with troubled teens for many years and is now counseling students who are emotionally handicapped. She is a committed mother of two, who after 24 years of marriage, is throwing in the towel, and she can't believe she is going to be single again at 46.

Tammi Leader Fuller has been “making news” in South Florida for twenty-five years. Her television career began with a summer internship at WLPG (ABC), when riots had the city of Miami in flames and hundreds of Cuban rafters washing ashore every single day in what was eventually dubbed the Mariel Boat Lift. She left local news after a couple of years to teach topless aerobics at a Club Med village in the Caribbean, then snapped back to reality and moved to New York, to become Bureau Chief for the Nightly Business Report, a nationally syndicated show on PBS. But eventually, Miami called her back home, and she jumped right back into producing newscasts for WTVJ (CBS/NBC) in 1984, spending a decade there, producing, writing and managing their special projects unit. She received various accolades for her work, including two Emmy Awards. In 1992, Tammi started her own production company, producing hundreds of stories for NBC’s The Today Show, the NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw, MSNBC and CNBC, as well as Fox’s America’s Most Wanted, and 48 Hours on CBS. She remains a regular contributor to the Today Show and the nationally syndicated entertainment program, Extra. In the past couple of years, Tammi has steered her company into a completely different direction, taking on the challenge of producing Corporate Marketing Videos and Travel Diaries for various resorts across the globe. Over the past two years, Tammi in Miami Productions has expanded to include six employees and a state of the art post production studio.

A Miami native, Sara Rosenberg’s only real time away from the city she loves was to attend college at Boston University’s School of Communication. With degree in hand, she returned to South Florida, where she spent the next twelve years working for Burger King in various marketing positions: negotiating film rights for Kids Meals, developing new burger variations, and launching the Value Menu. After that, Burger King’s parent company, Diageo, came calling with a chance to work in London for brands like Pillsbury, Guinness and Johnny Walker. Two years later, Sara yearned for home, so she accepted a position with The Miami Herald as Vice President of Consumer Marketing. Sara oversees over sixty employees in marketing, community relations, research, event marketing and creative. She is also the Publisher of StreetMiami, an alternative weekly publication focused on lifestyles and entertainment, and targeted at 18 to 34 year olds. It keeps her young. An avid public speaker, Sara speaks often to women’s groups about the myth of having it all. In addition, she is a sought-after presenter on innovating within the newspaper industry, and her travels have taken her as far away as Australia. Sara found a new hobby in writing this book, and has been saving a lot of money on therapy, too. She is married, round two, with one son and two stepsons.

From the Back Cover

We see you, stealing a glance at these
pages during your lunch break, in between
errands while the world is calling on your
cell phone and you pretend not to hear.
We understand because we’re just like you.

Six dynamic everyday divas, the self-proclaimed Miami Bombshells, gather every few weeks to kick off their power pumps, drink wine, gorge themselves on chocolate, and dish about the costs of having it all (or not): husbands or lovers, children, money, power, spirituality, and successful, rewarding careers.

During these sessions -- guiltily crammed in between business trips, charity events, and their children's activities -- they drop all pretenses and let fly their most personal bombshells, which eventually landed on the pages of this book. All of the stories are true. Some are signed, others are written anonymously, to protect the innocent (and the guilty).

Long ago, the Miami Bombshells refused to accept lives of quiet desperation, deciding instead to embrace their imperfections and put their own needs at the top of their to-do lists. In doing so, they redefine what it means to be a modern-day bombshell ... it's more about being courageous than curvaceous.

These six brave women divulge their vulnerabilities and most intimate secrets by hanging their dirty laundry on this literary clothesline. They describe coping with depression when expected to be the life of the party, why they fell into dubious relationships, how they dealt with rape, panic attacks, romantic email blunders, hair loss, the corporate vs. family juggling act, and nanny nightmares.

All women, no matter how different, go through similar experiences in life, and just knowing that is sometimes enough to make it better.Dish & Tell proves that reality is stranger (and much more interesting) than fiction.

Reviews

The Miami Bombshells, six 40-something females from Florida, offer further evidence of the national epidemic of people assuming the world is waiting for their life stories; having come together to spill their secrets to one another, the Bombshells are now spilling them in public. Under such chapter headings as "Who Am I?" and "To Love, Honor, and Oy Vey," this group—which includes high-powered executives, a TV producer, an Emmy-winning broadcaster and a school social worker—shares personal essays about marriage woes, mommy guilt, medical problems, depression and spirituality. When an issue is considered too personal—a violent date rape, an extramarital affair, a husband's mental illness—the essay is credited to "Bombshell." Some of the stories are compelling, but too often the details are banal or pocked with clichés. And while the Bombshells claim, "we're just like you," not too many people can call Katie Couric an old friend or complain of being "spoiled rotten" with "a housekeeper who irons my pajamas." The Bombshells want to share the value of developing friendship circles. They may provide a prod for some; those already clued in can skip this and simply spend some quality time with their own gang. (June)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Edition details

• Publisher: William Morrow
• Publication date: 2005
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0060777710
• ISBN 13: 9780060777715
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 280