First Issue Review: Aura: Jaffa Cake Years
Aura is Eve Pollard’s Parkhill Publications latest offering following the launch of Wedding Day last year. It is to be published monthly and the cover price is £2.50.
Aura aims to target ABC1 women with an average age of 40 – the ones who “read Honey, wore loon pants and Biba T-shirts, screamed at The Monkees, had the Che Guevara poster…” as the editorial suggests.
The front cover features a sultry shot of Susan Sarandon – subtle message ‘women don’t stop being sexy once they reach forty’ – and advertises articles on such dignitaries as Germaine Greer and Cherie Blair (Booth surely?). Other contributors include Fay Weldon, Paula Yates and ‘royal watcher’ Penny Junor along with the rather more heavyweight Sion Simon.
Ms Pollard allegedly promised “No 18-year-old models” – this may be true, but still you would be hard pushed to find anyone over size 10-12 gracing the fashion pages. All in all, the articles are well written and more appealing than what had become standard womens-mag fare (How to have great sex, bums, nails etc etc) and will undoubtedly be more interesting to today’s 40-something women.
If you are wondering where the Jaffa Cakes come into it, this apparently refers to “the juciest bit in the centre of our lives”. If nothing else Aura certainly proves that there can be life after forty.