This book review was written for Joyful Jubilant Learning‘s March book reviews. I am posting it here for my own personal timeline.
Barbara Stanny‘s “Prince Charming Isn’t Coming: How Women Get Smart About Money” is a great story with a problematic title. Unfortunately, it is also billed as a How To book, which is where it falls a bit short.
Title Turn Off
While the title of the book is provocative, it is a bit of a turn off for the two types of women who most need it:
- Those who – like Ms. Stanny herself – are waiting for Mr. Right to come along, take care of her (and her money) and leave her to idle away her time at luncheons and charity events without a care in the world.
- Those who – like me – are self-sufficient, never expected anyone to take care of me, and yet have some very destructive and unhealthy financial habits that haunt us, no matter how high an income we ever have.
For those who are expecting Prince Charming, the title is frightening. For those who scoff at the idea of Prince Charming, the title is insipid.
The Story
What Ms. Stanny does do well, however, is outline a great story: her own. As the daughter of one of the founders of H&R Block, not only was she a woman who should have never had to worry about money, but she was also someone who should have had enough exposure to good money management practices that she could have avoided finding herself in a financial mess.
Of course, the problem is that Ms. Stanny was raised by parents who brought her up to find a good husband who would take care of her, and to whom they could pass over the keys to her trust fund, and pat her on the head and send her on her way. That all worked just fine until it turned out that her Prince Charming was more of a frog with a knack for expensive – and unsuccessful – market speculation that eventually wiped out her cushy trust fund.
The How To
Ms. Stanny falls a bit short on her objective to make the book a great How To lesson for women. She does a marvelous job conveying precisely why women need to take care of their own financial destiny, but she does a less concret job explaining how. Authors like David Bach and Suze Orman offer much more tactical and actionable advice.
However, where Ms. Stanny hits a home run is making the case that learning these things are something that every woman should do as soon as possible. As a result, I have given a copy of her book to just about every woman I know – from friends with six-figure incomes and compulsive shopping problems, to my 16-year-old neice.
The only problem is that everytime I give it to someone, I feel compelled to talk fast to get them past the title.
The good news, however, is that in recent years, Ms. Stanny has written more books that are also worth reading (including Secrets of Six Figure Women), and has built our her online presence to include a blog where she does often offer the tactical advice her book was lacking.
The End Result
Like many authors, Ms. Stanny’s first real effort showed promise and some value, but didn’t quite hit the mark dead-on. “Prince Charming Isn’t Coming” would be one of those. However, it is still a quick, worthwhile read and something that most women will be able to relate to at least a bit – no matter what their relationship with money. It also does a great job of laying the foundation for much of her later body of work, which holds increased value.
What is More Useful?
How many of us know exactly what we need to be doing to get our finances in order, but just don’t do it – out of laziness, habit or denial? How many of us feel overwhelmed with anxiety at the prospect of dealing with our finances and chose to play ostrich instead? How many of us just really don’t have the first idea where to start and are truly baffled at how to begin to dig ourselves out of our financial hole?
Where I give Barbara Stanny the most credit is in tackling – and sharing her own experience with readers – the embarrassment of being a woman who “should have known better” but chose denial and avoidance for as long as possible before taking control of her finances herself. She could have taken a different approach to getting her message across, but she did a compelling job of sharing her own journey, including the embarrassing parts, to help her readers get past the intimidation of a subject that doesn’t need to be as crippling as it often is.
So, if you are looking for a step-by-step plan to turn your finances around, this book wouldn’t be your greatest resource. But, if you are one of millions of women who knows that she needs to tackle her issues with money, but lacks the motivation to truly dive into such an overwhelming and unappealing pool, this book could be a great place to start. By the time you’re done, you’ll feel like you just left a session with a great cheerleader urging you on to the next goal. And sometimes that is what we need before we can start planning next steps.
So what is it that you need? Detailed actions to take? Or merely the motivation to do what you already know you need to do?
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