Leslie Bennetts has been a contributing editor at Vanity Fair since 1988, writing on subjects that have ranged from movie stars to priest pedophilia, industrial pollution and U.S. anti-terrorism policy. Her 2005 cover story on Jennifer Aniston was the best-selling issue in the magazine’s history to date, and the People magazine cover story about Bennetts’ interview with Aniston was the best-selling issue in the history of People.

Prior to joining Vanity Fair, Bennetts spent fifteen years as a newspaper reporter. She started covering so-called “women’s issues” at The Philadelphia Bulletin in the early 1970’s, and has continued to write about women, marriage, families and parenting ever since. After five years at The Bulletin, where she won many awards for writing and reporting, Bennetts moved to The New York Times. During her ten years there, she began as a writer for the Style page and went on to cover national politics, metropolitan news, City Hall, and cultural news. She was the first woman ever to cover a presidential campaign for The Times.

Bennetts has also written for many other magazines, including Town & Country, Columbia Journalism Review, New York Magazine, Vogue, Good Housekeeping, Ladies Home Journal, More, House & Garden, Worth, Family Life, Parents, Child, Parenting, The Nation, Women’s Day, Tango, Modern Bride, and Women’s Health. She lives in Manhattan with her husband, journalist Jeremy Gerard, and their two children.

Blog Entries by Leslie Bennetts

Not so Happily Ever After

16 Comments | Posted October 6, 2008 | 10:25 AM (EST)


It's not a crime to publish a perky, upbeat book claiming that all women need do to be happy and wealthy is stop working and support their husbands' careers by massaging their egos and pushing them to get ahead. Megan Basham, the author of Beside Every Successful Man, had every...

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Demeaning Women in the Newspaper of Record: A Letter to Bill Keller

Posted April 25, 2007 | 06:22 PM (EST)


Anyone who follows The New York Times' coverage of women's issues knows that its record is wretched, from the Book Review's demeaning assessments of important books by women writers to the front-page stories and magazine covers that have presented a grossly incomplete and misleading picture of crucial subjects involving...

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The Feminine Mistake

Posted March 31, 2007 | 06:45 PM (EST)


Everyone knows that authors have to be prepared for negative reviews. What I didn't anticipate was an avalanche of blistering attacks by women who hadn't read my book but couldn't wait to condemn it. Their fury says a great deal about the current debate over women's choices -- all...

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