Recent years have witnessed a sneaky shift in the portrayal of plastic surgery, with mocking exposés giving way to the uncritical surgical vaudeville of shows like The Swan. Times writer Alex Kuczynski’s Beauty Junkies: Inside Our $15 Billion Obsession With Cosmetic Surgery promises a dose of perspective, if only because she is willing to explore her own contradictions—and the uglier side of her vanity, such as the day she missed a friend’s memorial because of a lip-puffing gone awry. A memoir of narcissism that may cause even the most Botoxed of readers to furrow their brows.

—Beauty Junkies, By Alex Kuczynski, Doubleday; October 17 ($24.95).

• Archive: “Arts and Culture”
• Articles by Emily Nussbaum
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