Publication Date: July 7, 2026
An infectious and utterly charming fictionalization of the iconic Helen Gurley Brown’s early years at the helm of Cosmopolitan, and the intrepid group of women she took under her wing to create one of the most talked about magazines of all time.
In 1965, Helen Gurley Brown, a soft spoken, self-professed “mouseburger,” is fresh off the runaway success of her book Sex and the Single Girl, a revolutionary call to single women urging them not to rush into marriage on anyone’s timeline but their own, and, even more radically, to enjoy their sex lives, gloriously free of shame. Upon the book’s publication, half the country is outraged (her mother, for one, hates it), and the other half will follow her anywhere. Moved by the thousands of letters arriving at her doorstep from readers desperate for advice, she marches from one Manhattan magazine conglomerate to another, looking for a perch from which to dispense her unconventional wisdom. At her last stop, she finally gets her shot: just three issues to turn around the flailing magazine Cosmopolitan.
Helen quickly assembles a team of smart, savvy single girls up to the task. Soon, their lives become the stuff of magazine cover lines: the gorgeous Book Editor’s doomed romance with a man she didn’t know was married—and her bold idea for revenge. The (unofficial!) Sex Editor’s trip to soak in the world’s first champagne glass hot tub, which takes a very wrong turn. The Entertainment Editor’s clash with Joan Crawford and interview with a Park Avenue call girl that leads to unexpected revelations.
Single Girls begins at the dawn of Helen’s storied tenure and journeys back to her youth, envisioning the devastations and people who forged her into a controversial legend. It imagines the way one unsinkable group of women navigated gender roles and workplace power dynamics long before these issues entered the headlines. With dazzling, high-energy prose, it recreates not just a movement, but a mood: one of ambition, reinvention, and the intoxicating thrill of being young when a new world was possible for a single girl if only she was fearless enough to reach out and grab it.
The unforgettable Helen Gurley Brown comes to life in a reimagined novel paying homage to her rise as a cultural icon.
Author John Searles traces Helen’s rise to fame beginning in 1965 in Single Girls. Still soaring from the rousing success of her novel, Helen looks to start a magazine designed to cater to the needs of young women seeking to enjoy themselves and their sex lives before marrying.
The author traces the moment when, at 43, Helen gets put in charge of Cosmopolitan, a floundering publication on its last legs. With a three-issue contract as momentum, Helen sets out to build her team of remarkable ladies (and decades later, a gentleman like the author).
While inspired by real people and events, the story is fictional. However, it captures the determination of a woman who blazed a trail through the publishing industry to bring information to her intended audience.
Single Girls delivers a fascinating look inside the early years of Helen Gurley Brown’s legacy—full of wit, charm, and fiery determination.
John Searles is a New York Times bestselling and award-winning author of SINGLE GIRLS, HER LAST AFFAIR, HELP FOR THE HAUNTED, STRANGE BUT TRUE and BOY STILL MISSING. His books have been published in over a dozen languages and have been voted best of the year or top picks by Boston Globe, Entertainment Weekly, Salon, and the American Library Association. The former longtime books editor of Cosmopolitan, he has also appeared on NBC’s Today Show, CBS This Morning, CNN, NPR’s Fresh Air and other shows to discuss his books and also his favorite books of the season.
