A review by roseleaf24
The Lady from the Black Lagoon: Hollywood Monsters and the Lost Legacy of Milicent Patrick by Mallory O'Meara

3.0

The story of Milicent Patrick is fascinating. She was the designer of the Creature from the Black Lagoon, but in a time of many uncredited workers in the movie industry, the head of the makeup department took all the credit for her work. What she faced working in the movie industry and in a creative career in the 50s and 60s is similar to many of the problems still facing women in creative production fields today. O'Meara is an engaging writer who showed the struggles she faced in her research and connected that to the full unveiling of Patrick's story. I appreciated the connections to the struggles O'Meara has faced, as well, but over a page in each chapter of the author's thoughts about this was a bit much. I wanted the focus to remain more on Patrick, and I also thought the author did a bit too much conjecture as to how Patrick must have felt about various aspects of her life.